My good girl
by Yueres De Leo
Summary: "Thats a good girl" He always said "That's my good girl " Doflamingo. OC. Law
1. Not cold

Disclaimer: I don't own One piece.

A/N: I don't really know why I wrote this, so please don't be so hard on me.

She watched as the water took some sand with it while slipping away from her, tilting her face when the wave got to hear once more, getting her even more wet. She sat on her knew, unaware of the heavy sighs that the maids that were a few feet behind her let out- all the hours expended on trying to dress her had been in vain. When the water approached again, the little girl planted her hands against it, feeling the sand slipping through her finger, feeling the water doing it as well. She pouted, annoyed, and closed her small fists again.

She blinked a couple of times in a row when the water slipped away from her again, but feeling like she had something between her hands. She raised them together, like she was holding something, and opened her palms near her face.

The bubble of water about the size of her palms floated in the air on top of her skin as her curious eyes stared at it intensely, her mouth slightly open because of how pretty it was, enough to get her childish mind's attention. Then sun that had been covering her was replaced with a huge shadow, covering her, and making the girl crane her neck as much as she could, trying to see the person who now was standing behind her, watching her moves. Just as she stopped watching, the bubble exploded, wetting her hands in the process, causing the child to look back at her palms again.

"Yue~ " The man with the thick coat of bright pink feathers called the girl, noticing that he didn't have her attention anymore. But she was way too busy watching with a frown her small hands, which were now wet. The girl planted her hands on the sand again, this time moving her knees so she could get closer to the water, but hand lifting her stopped her movements. Doflamingo was not about to let her get close too to the water- having her to drown on the sea because she could never learn how swim was not an option. It had taken too much work to get that Akuma no mi, plus, getting Yue to eat it had been a hell of a work. It had been just an experiment- he just wanted to know what would happen.

She shook his hands as she was in the air, feeling her skin get too cold for her liking. When the cold feeling was still there, she shook her hands even more quick, keeping her frown at all times, even when the man sat her on his arm, watching carefully while approaching him in case she got angry and decide to start moving her legs as well.

The skirt of her pink dress was a disaster with sand and water, but the girl didn't seem to be bothered in the least, she was too busy looking at her palms, shaking them occasionally

"Fufufufufu , they are not going to get completely dry that way" He brought on one of the ends of his coat up to her hands with one of his, drying the remaining water with the bright pink feathers.

"Cold water" Dropped the girl with complete seriousness, once away he had finish. The man laughed a little at the decision that her eyes held while looking at her tiny hands. He stayed silent when she looked at him with large, red eyes, tilting her face to one side "Feathers ... not cold?"

"Exactly," He laughed again and nodded "You were practicing, huh, Yue? Fufufufufu" The maniac smile appeared on his face again, but the girl in his arms was not conscious enough to know that she had to be scared of that type of smile "That's a good girl" He turned around, passing the maids to reach the beach chair that had been placed under an umbrella. He sat up, stretching his legs and placing the child in his lap, putting a hand on top of the silver, almost white, head "That's my good girl~"


	2. Prettier

**Disclaimer: I dont own One piece. **

**A/N: English its not my native language, so please understand. **

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The female laughter caught her attention, but she frowned a little- those were not the maids laughing . Nor was the laughter of someone she knew, and _he_ never let anyone near her room, it was a rule, almost as serious as the rule that he always repeated to her, the only rule she had.

"Don't open the windows, and if I'm not with you, you don't get out of this hallway"

She hadn't understood. She had not asked either.

Laughter rang again, this time harder, mixed with the laughter of a man that she knew well.

Blinking a few times, letting go of the wood that had been holding, she walked on top of the cold floor of the hall towards the room that was at her left. It was automatic –she just listened, and walked towards the sound. She had always been that way since she could remember; if Yue concentrated, sometimes she could imagine a woman calling for her, stretching her hand to her as _he_ did. But the image was so blurred that she lost interest on it really quickly.

The door was the same size as the one at her room, but it was darker, and she was sure she had never entered that room before. Once again Yue stood on tiptoes, achieving reaching the handle with much effort, smiling brightly when she could turn it successfully.

When she took a look inside the room the smile disappeared completely.

He was sitting in a chair that looked a lot like the ones that were at her playroom, with a glass on his hand full of a red liquid that didn't attract her attention. Around him were many women in dresses that did not look like the one that she wore on the least- some looked a little like the ones that the maids dressed, but the ones that she was seeing now were of different colors and with odd shapes that she didn't like, all of them shorter than the dresses she had seen before.

One woman was sitting on his lap, the same place where he sat her when he wanted to stroke her hair, but even knowing that, the girl understood that what she was seeing was completely different.

A part of her mind of almost five years realized that _they_ were the reason they never left her alone after lunch- she knew it instinctively, also, the way in which her stomach turned was way too uncomfortable for her liking.

Doflamingo looked up when he pulled the glass of wine away from his lips, licking them because of the taste left behind by the drink, catching the silver highlights her hair had under the sunlight that came streaming through the open windows, and frowned.

She had awakened early, and found him in a situation he did not want her see until at least a couple of years. He opened his mouth to call for her, pushing with one hand the body of the woman that didn't let him look completely at her, but before he could even say anything, the door was closed again.

"What did you do now?" Later that day, when Vergo came to give a report and the girl had hung on his neck, he saw Doflamingo watching her with a frown and crossed arms over his chest. It only took Vergo a one minute to know that something had happened, seeing how Yue completely ignored the blonde when she walked by his side to get back to her play room.

"She caught me cheating on her" He mumble "And now she doesn't want to talk to me"

With completely impassive face, Vergo had said something that made perfect sense, and by general rules it was completely true. Doflamingo just hoped he was right "She's a kid, she will forget about it soon enough"

She didn't speak to him for almost a month.

So Doflamingo had resorted to a quick movement, and without any kind of moral, he had practically shaken the red gem that was shaped like a tear in front of the girl's eyes, who had been dragged to his lap.  
"You like it? You think it's pretty?" She was upset because she had been interrupted while she had been playing , but the red glow caught her attention for a second , realizing that the color was a lot like her eyes. It took moment before she looked at the man's face, who smiled mischievously, and nodded "Then it's yours"

He grabbed one of her small hands, which were not even half of one of his, and left the jewel on her palms. She looked down, examining the gem with big curious eyes, lifting it a little to see have a better look, holding the chain from which it hung . After a few seconds she looked at him again. .

"Really?" Doflamingo laughed heartily, listening for the first time in weeks the first words addressed to him, as he lowered his hand to her head and stroke the silver hair

"Really" He nodded.

"Why?"

"Why not?" He made face, removing the chain from her hands to pass it over her head until it hung from her neck- she was still small enough so that he could do that. The man assumed that in the near future he wouldn't be able to do it anymore "After all you've always been a good girl" He smiled sideways "My good girl"

"Are you sure of that?" At night, the man had been sitting on one of the chairs on her room while the girl sleep deeply holding at the feathers of his coat with some papers at hand when Vergo walked through the door, pausing for a moment before asking.

"Why do you ask?" Doflamingo raises an eyebrow without moving.

"That's your family's jewel, isn't it?"

"So what?" He laughed, but not loud enough for the child to move or wake up "I'm not going to use it, and she likes it" The maniac smile grew wider in his face "If she keeps thinking that things that I can give her are prettier than the things that she can see outside her room, then she would not want to leave. She cannot ho out of this room, and she better believe for a few years that it is natural for her to be here."

The other man just shook his head, sighing almost imperceptibly.


	3. Another life

A/N: I dont really speak english so PLEASE be patient with me.

Disclaimer: I do not own One Piece.

Sitting on the chair that was next to the table where she ate every day, her head was down while looking as the servants gathered the pieces of broken dishes that were besides her bed. You could even say she looked like a puppy sitting in a corner.

She didn't want to break the plates; it had not been her intention.

It was the first time she tried to "lift" anything besides liquid because she was bored of seeing water floating in the air almost every day; she thought she could hold them longer, and she could have probably done it, if she had not move them from place to place. They had not gone too far, only been able to pass the double door that separated the room where her bed was from the room where the table where she ate and the other furniture were, when she thought she could drop her attention a little.

After the three dishes fell from the air and crashed with the floor, fortunately a few feet away from her, it had not been three seconds when the maids had already opened the door, screaming in horror when they saw her trying to lift the pieces to put them on the table. And now she was there, confined to the chair until they were sure that there was nothing she could hurt herself with.

Normally, by that time, the laughter was supposed to fill her room and the hallway, while he opened the door with the same stretched smile he always had on his face. But as Yue had the impression that it was really going to happen, she knew that was not possible. It had been two days since he had gone to do something outside, and had not heard from him since then.

It was not strange at all; he had already done the same thing in the past, more than once.

But that didn't meant she was used to it. If he was not there, she had no one to talk to, and the maids were not the best people to comment about what an eight-year-old girl had to say, and it was really rare when Vergo visited. Nobody besides him ever visited her; she even wondered if they actually knew she was there- Yue had heard a few times voices from outside, just under the balcony, but she had never seen anyone.

"Everything is clean now, Yueres -sama " The girl raised her head when one of the maids approached her, with folded hands on top of her legs as usual and her back completely straight - Doffy said many times that the dresses that he made her wear made her look like a little doll, but Yue thought that the maids looked even more perfect than the dolls "And you had already taken your snack, so it's time for you to take a nap"

"I'm not sleepy"

"They are young master's orders. You also need to have enough rest. You need to be awake to receive him when he returns from his trip" She bent a little, extending a hand to her after a second. Yue looked at her with a slight frown before letting out air, almost as if she had sighed, in before taking the hand and placing her bare foot on top of the floor.

"_To do what? __It's not like I'm going to do something different today_"

She would never have dared to say it out loud.

By saying things like that, bad thing would happen.

The seven year old girl was lead around the room and through the double door, climbing the sheets to get on top of the bed, waving with one hand the stuffed animals that were on the pillows to built something like a cave between them.

"Have sweet dreams, Yueres -sama "

Yue didn't lift her head off the pillow until she heard the door close. The soft _click_ was the signal to lift her face, watching the white doors fully closed. She sighed, turning around and looking at the fabrics of different colors that were hanging from the top of the roof.

There was not much to do.

The truth was that there was nothing to do but she tried not to think about it.

She closed her eyes, forcing herself to sleep, trying to think that when she woke up, he would really be there. Hours later when she opened them again, she thought that the pink feathers that she could see from the corner of her eyes, was a dream, but it was easy after a moment to realize that it was real.

"Welcome, Doffy" She rubbed her eyes with one hand, yawning as she sat on the bed, letting go the bear she had been hugging in her sleep, trying to look at the person who was sitting on the edge of the bed.

"Have you been a good girl while I was gone?" Many times she had asked him if his face didn't hurt because of smiling so much, but the answer was always the same; always had laughed when she asked "Fufufufufu , of course you've been" He put a hand on her head " I brought some for you "  
Yue tilted her head to one side, blinking a little as she watched as he got up and walked to the double doors that at the time, she noticed, were open , passing to the other room. She got off the bed in a jump, trying to cover the same distance in less time.

It was a dead stop even before entering the room, looking with suspicion the new object that was besides the table.

"What's that?"

"This is a piano, will keep you entertained" He comment when the girl approached, watching as she practically gave walked around it while staring, probably half expecting it to start moving "You no longer play with your dolls," he added with a laugh, stretching hand to lift the lid which hid the white keys "With this, you can make music " She came near when she hear the first note, watching as the man pressed a key with one finger. She blinked a few times before stretching a hand too, smiling as the sound filled the room. She climbed the bank that was in front of the unknown object, giving her better view of the keys "You're good reading. I'll bring you books and you can learn how to play"

"Strange sound" She laughed, pressing several keys simultaneously. The man chuckled as well

"I can't eat dinner with you today, but if I'll come tomorrow for breakfast" As always, he put a hand on her head, caressing her hair for before removing it and walking towards the door, passing by the girl's side.

He didn't eat everyday with her, and there were days when she didn't see him at all. The maids always answered the same way when she asked them, " He is a really busy person" but even with seven years she knew he couldn't be busy all the time- She may have never left the room, not at least since she was very small and paid no attention to the rules, and she may only be seven years old, almost eight , but she was not stupid; she knew that at the other side of the door, Doofy had another life.

A life she would never know or have.

She looked at his back covered with pink feathers, mentally asking him to turn around.

He didn't do it.

And once more the door was closed, leaving her alone with the piano.


	4. The first time

Disclaimer: I dont own one piece.

A/N: My mother language its not English, so please, bear with me and my mistakes. Leave review to know it I should continue.

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_Don't open windows._

_Don't open the door if I'm not in the room with you._

_Don't go out to the balcony._

_If you hear voices in the hallways, don't make any sound._

_You understand, Yue? Sure you understand; you are a good girl, right?_

It had been repeated to her thousands of times over the last few years; in the same way, with the same voice and the same words over and over and over again.

She couldn't remember when he had made the rules, nor how much time she had remembered, but it was long enough to have them knew by heart. They were not many, but if you only had two rooms to walk in like her, they became quite heavy- heavy enough to make her hate them with intensity, always since she remembered. But she had never questioned them. She assumed that at some point of her life she had had to try and break them, and she even manage to get the maids to told her that when she was younger, she went out of the room very often; "you never got very far" they always added, and she didn't doubt it. Maybe that was why Doffy insisted in reminded her of them, as if he feared she would forget them anytime soon.

The first time Yue saw a person besides Vergo or the maids, or Doffy, she was eight, and it wasn't until years later that she realized that the rules were imposed to avoid just that, for reasons her childish mind couldn't understand the first time they had met. However, she had paid enough attention to the moment to remember every detail of what had happened, realizing how easy it had been to break the rules without even thinking about it.

She was sitting on the floor with all the lights off, looking through the glass doors that separated her room from the balcony. Over the railing and in a pot, there was the latest gift Doffy had brought her from trips: flowers that only bloomed under the moonlight once a week. She had been watching in silence as the floor opened, and its whiteness seemed to shine like stars, making them stand out from all the flowers besides them that were at the gardener.

Yue wanted to open the doors and go out onto the balcony to get a closer look, but she knew she couldn't, or rather, she shouldn't.

She hadn't taken off the eyes of the flower pot since the first flower had opened.

And it was because that same determination she had had that she got alarmed when the pot was gone, and in its place was a person standing on the railing. She would have thought that it was Doffy, because after learning that she could actually fly nothing coming from him could surprise her, but the person didn't had the big coat of feathers that she completely loved.

Doffy almost never went out without his coat.

The person was also very petite to be Doffy, who she recalled almost as a giant, tall enough to sit her on his arm in the same way in which the maids said he carried her when she was a baby. The shadow jumped off the railing and into the floor, looking over his shoulder before moving to the door, stretching his hand to open it.

She couldn't look at the face of the person because the moonlight was shining on his back, but that didn't prevent her from realizing that she didn't knew him, and it was the moment she knew she had to shout. It was what they had always said to her- if someone she didn't know came into her room, she had to scream, and because Doffy's room was in front of hers, he sure would listen. It had _always_ been what they had told her.

But there was a problem.

She realized that when she rose from the floor as quietly as possible, looking curiously at the person who opened the door, still looking back over his shoulder, not noticing her presence in the slightest as he closed the door and sighed with relief once he was inside, leaning a hand against the white frame. It seemed as if he was hiding from something or like he was running from someone, and for a moment she wondered if he had come into the room because of that. How had reached the balcony? Where were the flowers? Who was he hiding from? What was his name?

The questions piled up one after another in her head.

And the problem was getting bigger and bigger with each second that passed.

_She didn't want him to leave._

"Who are you?"

The way in which he had jumped as the words left her mouth said that he obviously hadn't expected that someone was in the same room as him. Almost immediately they boy turned to her with an expression that Yue found really curious, one she had never seen in the face of the people she knew- not in the maids face's, or in Vergo's, or Doffy's.

Something new.

He was not much older than her, or at least he wasn't tall enough to be. But she only had herself as a point of comparison, so she could be completely wrong. Curiosity almost radiated from her face as he stared back, rigid in his place, to the point where she doubted he was even blinking.

"I am Yue" She offered after a long moment of silence, waiting for an answer.

Even with the almost complete darkness which covering almost all the room, she could see his face a bit thanks to the moonlight coming through the window. Black hair and apparently clear eyes- Yue couldn't really say. It seemed to take several minutes when another voice rang in the room, making the girl's face light up with a smile, perhaps _too_ big.

"Law" He said at last, standing with tense shoulders, but never letting his eyes leave her person, as if examining her and secretly hoping she wasn't as harmless as she seemed "Trafalgar Law"

In eight years, it was the first time one of his gifts had been forgotten.

In all her life, that was the first time she forgot about to _him_, rather than him about her.


	5. Good evening

Disclaimer: I do not own One piece.

A/N: My mother language is not english, so please bear with me a litle. Hope you like it!

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As quickly as he had come, he had left- it remained in her mind how he went out to the balcony again, standing on the railing and disappearing before she could say anything at all, leaving the flowers where they have been before. As if nothing had happened. As if he had been a ghost.

After they had said their names, how long he stood there? A minute? Two? Maybe even three. It had been so quick. Had they said something besides their names? Yue didn't think so.

As if it had been a dream.

A really cruel dream.

"You are very distracted today"

She keep looking at the bowl of porridge that she had been moving slowly with a spoon, almost without realizing it, lifting her face to look at the man sitting to her right at the round table, with a cup of coffee in his right hand. Maybe his eyes were hidden by the dark glasses, and the reflection of the sun coming through the window that were besides them didn't help at all, but she just knew that he was probably staring at her without blinking.

"I didn't sleep well

It was the first time she lied to Doffy.

When she felt guilty she tried to convince herself that it was not really a lie- she certainly couldn't sleep at all the night before. But a little voice really deep inside her mind reminded her that, even if she wanted to believe so, that was not the reason of why she had that face all morning.

Since they had reached what Doffy had said was a "castle", because from where she was she couldn't really tell, it had not been more than a year, and if before she had thought Doffy spent a lot of time outside, it was obvious that she hadn't seen anything. She was use to go a day or two without seeing him, but now, he even spent weeks outside, and the only thing that guaranteed her that he hadn't forgot about her were the calls she received at the pink Den Den Mushi that they maids installed on her living room, which was at least two times bigger than the room that she had before.

They made her feel even more alone when no one was there, and at night when she was trying to sleep even the pretty lights of different colors that were hanging from the didn't help. It took Yue hours to sleep, and that didn't mean that the nightmares would stay away from her mind.

Once she said half of what she thought out loud.

"But you'll always be here to make my day, right Yue? Fufufufufufu. Because you're a good girl, you're my good girl"

And she couldn't say anything when he answered that.

It made her happy. When she said that kind of things she was very happy.

But when the night got to her, or when the maids came in saying that someone was calling him, or when Vego came in and almost dragged him out of the room, that same happiness turned into sadness. And she never dares to ask, no matter how many years she tried to do so. Doffy always frowned when he sensed what she was trying to ask, and that simple twist of lips made her close her mouth even before one word came out.

It was why the "Why I can't go with you?" never left her lip , not once in all the years she had been with him .

"That's it, I have a great idea" Later that day, when she was practicing with the plastic plates that had been specially brought for when she did things like that, the girl stopped looking at the floating objects to look at the man, which had her sitting on his knees "From tomorrow I will start to personally teach you how to dance, I cannot rely on someone else to teach you the correct rhythm; the businesses has begun to take its own shape, don't need much supervision."

"I have to know how to dance?" She tilted her face to one side, looking puzzled, not understanding the reason behind his words. Although he almost never had a reason, he always did what he wanted when he wanted just because he wanted to, even she knew that.

"Fufufufufu, of course. How do you think you are to dance with me when you grow if you don't know how?" The smile appeared on his face, as wide as ever, as he leaned the side of his head hand, staring at her.

"Dance with you?"

"Only me"

"Why?"

The man laughed heartily. He was not used to being questioned because of his decisions, but the innocent curiosity that the girl possessed was just too fun to hold back a laugh, or to deny her that right and make Yue obey him as the rest of the world did, even though she always did it at the end.

"Why not?"

It was the answer he usually gave her.

She tilted her face to the other side.

"…Really? You really are going to do it?" She looked at him with huge red eyes, almost without blinking, completely hopeful. His smile remained in place as he stretched a hand to place it on top of the silver hair, a gesture that in the last eight years, he discovered, had become a habit.

"Of course. When have I broken my promises?"

A huge smile appeared on Yue's face, who at the time was practically glowing with joy. Doflamingo laughed loudly again, still with a hand on her hair- in cases like hers, innocence was entertaining, and logic told him that even when she grew that innocence would still be there in the future, every she looked at him or when she asked a question.

The dishes fell to the floor and bounced when the door opened without any warning, and that immediately told Yue that it wasn't the maids who opened the door, because they always knocked. The tall figure of a man stood besides the dark wooden door, closing it with one hand while the other was behind him, almost like it was glued to his back. He turned towards them, hiding the other arm as he walked behind the couch that was facing the one they were using.

"Vergo -san! "

She jump from Doffy's knees, landing on her bare feet before rounding the furniture that was between her and the man, practically hangings herself at his leg as she looked up with an almost identical smile of the one she had given the blonde man just seconds before. Vergo looked down, almost doubling his neck to look at her, nodding almost gently; that was his way to say hello, and she reacted to it the same way she had reacted the last eight years.

She laughed.

"Ah, Vergo" said in greeting the man on whom she had been sitting, not moving from his position "Did you manage to catch him?"

"He had gone really far, so I did that I thought was convenient"

"Fufufufufufu, perfect"

"Who?"

For a second, she thought she saw as a grin crossed Doffy's face, but as quickly as it had appeared, it was gone, as if it had never been there on the first place. She knew that it was because she was asking more than she would normally ask, but her curiosity was too much to hold her questions back.

She even thought that he was not going to answer.

"A small animal that pretends to be older than he really is" He reached hand out for her, in a silent invitation. Without thinking twice about it and more by inertia than a thought about what she was doing, she dropped Vergo's pants and approached him, letting him lift her and sit her on his lap, this time completely looking at him as he combed her hair with a big hand "That's why I prefer you, you had always been a good girl"

The tone was the same that he had always been used with her, but what he was saying for some reason created a chill that ran across her back. She looked at the dishes on the floor over her shoulder, lifting them, knowing that would be enough to distract him and forget about the subject, or at least give her enough time to forget about the feeling on her back.

That night, before going to bed, she looked through the glass doors and onto the balcony.

And she waited.

And waited.

And waited.

But no matter how much she waited, the flower pot was never moved from its place at the railing.

Days. A week

She began to think that it had really been a dream. But it had been so real it hurt to think that it was not the reality.

She sighed, pressing a hand against the cool glass, watching the flower pot and they completely open petals- the white flowers she had been waiting so eagerly to see again. Why wasn't happy she then? Yue sighed again, dragging her feet towards the double door, reaching the handle without much trouble. The light coming through the windows next to the table she used as a dining room illuminated almost everything, so she didn't had any problem in reaching the piano bench that was in the corner of the room. She climbed and sat there, staring blankly the piece of wood that covered the white and black keys, lifting it with both hands and without hesitation.

All she could really do was play the piano- every day, every hour, "_Music is often heard in the hallways_" she didn't know if it was true or not, but she was not going to question it anyway, no matter what; she never really felt the need of doing such things.

Whatever it was, she doubted that anyone could hear the soft melody coming out from of her room, the one that no one seemed to notice, probably never wondering what was inside.

"I think I've heard that before"

Yue almost fell off the bench in a jump, not expecting that someone would speak to her at that time- had not even waited for someone to appear in her room at all. Turning quickly to her right, she looked for the source of the voice and found him standing by the frame of the doors to her bedroom.

There were differences, like the fact that she could see bandages on his arms, but that took a second of her attention before realizing who it was.

She was sure she had read before that looking open mouthed at someone was rude, or maybe it had been told to her by the servants during her classes; Yue didn't remember at the time and honestly it didn't care. She hardly blinked as she looked at his face, remembering the lines she so carefully had observed a week ago. She actually was surprised of how much she remembered.

"Good evening" He greeted, this time he being the one that expected an answer from the other person in the room.

Yue hadn't fully reacted yet, or at least as she should been reacting, but he seemed to understand and said nothing more, just staying where he was standing, still as a statue, taking advantage of the moment to take note of what he had thought the first time he had seen her.

She probably was not as harmless as she looked.

With his gaze on her Yue seemed reconnect her brain to the rest of her body, smiling in the same way in which she had smiled at Doffy that same evening before he left her alone again. She wanted to say his name out loud, but she knew it was a bad idea; Doffy door was just outside hers. But even if the word sounded like a whisper, it had been heard in all the room

The word that she had repeated in her mind many times in the past week.

The one that she could never call out loud.

The way in which he replied- with a smirk- said he had actually heard her.

"Law "


	6. Polar Bears and Fireworks

Disclaimer: I dont own One Piece.

Leave review so I can know if I should continue or not!

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"Two chairs?" Yue repeated, looking at the Den Den Mush that was in front of her, the one that used lenses, like the man she was speaking to was standing in front of her. She leaned over the arm of the couch that was against the wooden table in top of which the snail was, her foot swinging over de edge.

"_Fufufufufu , your next task_"

"If I can't hold them and they fall, it won't be pretty at all…." She muttered, trying to erase the image of the maids picking up the pieces of broken wood from the floor a couple of months ago. Certainly it had not been for pretty.

"_Fufufufufufu, you can do it_"

A scream was heard in the background of the other side of the line, but was quickly shut by something that had caused a dull sound, almost like it was a hit by something. Yue looked strangely the Den Den Mushi, but the sail remained with the same broad smile as always, as if nothing had happened. But she was sure she had heard something.

"What was that?"

"_Nothing that is worth your attention_" He assured her "_Also, remember to stay awake long enough today and look out the window, you don't want to miss it, right?"_ She blinked a couple of times in a tow, not understanding his words at all. She looked up at the calendar that was open besides the Den Den Mushi on the wooden table.

Her mouth opened slightly in surprise, tilting her face to the right.

"Is it today?"

"_Fufufufufufu could it be that you forgot about it_?" Laughter echoed through the room even though the owner was not present "I'll back tomorrow morning, so I can make up for the lost time at breakfast" Yue nodded, even if he couldn't see her she was absolutely sure that he knew what she was doing "Be a good girl like always, Yue. Don't forget to 'do' your homework"

The Den Den Mushi stopped smiling , and its eyes went down a little, indicating that the connection definitely stopped. She stretched her hand to place the microphone in its place, and stretched further to reach the calendar with the same hand. She took a really close look of it when she sat again, going through each box until she got to where she was.

"How could I forget about it?" Mumbled Yue, tilting her face to one side.

"Yueres-sama, lunchtime " The said girl turned her head, hearing the knock on the door , looking as maids entered with trays in her hands. She rose from the sofa and left the calendar on top of it, walking towards the roundtable. She paused to look out the Windows towards the sky, smiling broadly when she realized something she hadn't noticed until that moment.

* * *

"Vergo -san is not that bad"

"With you" growled the boy, staring at the pages of the book he held in his hands, analyzing the information that slowly entered in his brain, linking it with the one that was already there from previous readings. But Law still had fresh the memories of the man he hated with all his soul, standing before him with his hands behind his back, fully aware of the difference in height between the two of the and the effect it had on the time of a scolding .

He just hated him so much.

"Maybe if you called him as he wants, he wouldn't be like that with you"

"No thanks" Yue laughed, cutting the thread that she held between her fingers with the small scissors she had on her left hand. Even being two years older than her, Law was surprisingly stubborn and once he said something or thought in way about something, he kept it to the end, that made him a little hard to understand when he told her stories about things he had seen outside her windows.

"Ready" She smiled, leaving the scissors and needle on the floor besides her.

"What did you do today?" He looked with undisguised curiosity the stuffed animal in her hands as she raised it to observe it carefully, looking for some kind of detail that could have had gone under noticed in the process. The white color that was used probably made a really big contrast with the orange under the sunlight, but now with only the moon and the lamp that was on the other side of the room, the colors looked a little bit dull.

"It's a white bear. How did you said the white bears were called?" She didn't take her eyes off her work, still going over every detail as she turned the bear a little in her hands.

"Polar Bears"

"It's a polar bear" Yue smirked when she didn't find any details she didn't like, sitting the stuffed toy on her lap, touching his ears with her index finger.

"Why did you dress him with orange?" She looked up to see the boy sitting next to her, his back against the balcony doors so that the light of the moon could help him read. He had a raised eyebrow and a smirk on his lips, still holding the book in his hands "It looks weird"

"You are so cruel!"

The sound of the explosion rumbled in the room, causing the glass they had their backs against to vibrate for a moment. The two young kids looked how their shadows were being surrounded by a bright pink light, and one second after it changed to green . They turned at the same time, watching the lights that rose to the sky, covering the horizon.

"Finally" Law watched Yue as he smiling as she stood up, pressing a hand against the glass, holding the bear against her by using one arm; the fireworks seemed to enchant her the same way in which his stories did.

"Did you know this was going to happen?"

"Of course I knew, every year he tells them to do the same. This morning I realized that this year you were going to be here, that's why I wanted you to stay until so late" She looked down at him, and Law could see how the bear was enlightened for moments by the lights coming from outside. Green. Blue. Purple. And the smile was still there when the boy looked at Yue, as if the sound didn't brother her even though she absolutely hated loud noises "I don't want to spend my twelve birthday only this bear and the fireworks"


	7. Slowly, but noticeable

Disclaimer: I don't own One piece.

Leave review so I can know if continue or not. Hope you like it!

A/N: English is not my first language, so please bear with me.

* * *

She passed a picture. Then another and another. Yue keep passing them even when she saw the first picture almost six times- she didn't stop, frowning and biting her lower lip in concentration, absently stretching a hand to grab the cup of hot chocolate that was on top of a small plate at her side on the floor, giving it a sip before putting the cup back to its place, crossing her legs for more comfort. They had begun to hurt from sitting on her knees for so long. Leaving on the floor the stack of photos that she could in her hands, she spread them with the others, leaning forward, as if with that she was going to see something she hadn't noticed before, even though it didn't seem possible, since she had analyze them so many times she practically knew them by heart by now.

She frowned.

It had just been a question.

Only one of the thousands that he asked her almost every time he came, even though she had absolutely nothing interesting to say, even less when they had spent so many years knowing each other. What something she could say would be interesting to him, someone who could walk on the castle as he pleased? And now that he was seventeen he could go aboard Doffy's ships and go to different places, so why he kept asking? Yue had lost count of all the times he had been gone for a month or two, each time coming back with stories that turned more and more interesting.

It had been a question that for a moment gave a feeling of taboo so disgusting and deep that she didn't even think much about the answer, but then she had gone and looked for the box that had all the pictures the maids had taken during her childhood inside, which was on top of the library nest to the door- sometimes she appreciated more than usual her Aki Aki no Mi for letting her do that kind of things. It helped her to forget that her height limited her in doing certain things.

"_Focus_" She mentally scolded herself, crossing her arms over her chest as her brow furrowed even more, feeling the frustration growing with each photo that she ruled out, even though she would look back at it again "_Is there another box with pictures? I'm not sure, __I should look again ..."_

It had only been a_ stupid _question.

_"Do you know who your parents are?"_

Law had no idea how much she hated him for implanting the idea in her head the night before, and planned to let him know it in the worst way the next time she sew him-oh no, wait , he was a _traveling._

"_Who the hell does he think he is to go and leave me with this situation?"_

"What are you doing?"

Jumping a bit in surprise, Yue looked to her right almost immediately. Doffy was closing with one hand the window from which he had possibly entered, approaching her with one hand in his pocket, sitting on the couch that was in front of her- he was not surprised that she was on the floor or that her shoes were lying in a corner of the room, not even surprised that her hair was in a bun that was probably poorly done, but he looked puzzled with a raised eyebrow at the photos that were spread almost all over the floor around her.

"I just ... felt really nostalgic, and I ended up taking out all the pictures" She didn't dare to ask directly, having the feeling that he would react in the same he reacted before when she was stupid enough to ask him if he could take her out with him in one of his trips, so she looked for ways to get around the topic "Why there are no photos of me before I was two years old?"

"You were a restless baby" He shake his hand from side to side, not really caring about it "It was really difficult to dress you, how would you stay still so we could take a picture? You were absurdly energetic"

She nodded slowly, biting the inside of her cheek.

And as always, he saw right through her.

"What do you want to ask me?" He said after a second.

She paused, her lips pressed into a straight line and her eyes fixed on her own face in a picture, obviously many years ago. She was probably five years old, and was sitting on Doffy's knees with a red dress that she could actually kind of remember, raising her hands as if reaching for something invisible, or as if she was trying to reach the camera. Vergo had probably been standing behind the maid who had taken the picture.

Her eyes passed from picture to picture, being all of them almost completely identical scenes, all with the same scene behind them, having taken them all within the same room. But no matter how much she saw them, no matter how hard she tried to see the reflections or the corners, Yue couldn't find anyone who she didn't know or that she didn't currently see. No one who could awake the slightest spark of recognition in her mind. She pressed her index finger over the face of the man who seemed to always hold her on the pictures, and without taking her eyes off the paper, she opened her mouth.

"...Who are my parents?"

Almost at the same moment she regretted having asked.

"I don't know, and you should be thankful for that, my words wouldn't be friendly at all" When she looked up she saw him frown and stayed as still as possible, feeling very small at the look he gave her behind the lenses. Even from where she was she could feel the discomfort that the topic gave him "They left you, and I found you one of my trips and took you with me. Isn't that horrible? Leaving a baby in the middle of a city where it rains every day. There are heartless people out there Yue, better to stay away from them"

She paused, not removing her eyes from the photos in front of her. Didn't know what she had been hoping, like, really? Maybe finding out if it was worth trying to look for something that didn't even remember. She looked up, noticing that the man a hand stretched towards her; she rose from the floor after a moment. Yue took the hand with one of her and sat next to the man, allowing herself to lay her head on his knee while bringing her legs on top of the couch.

Yue closed her eyes.

The image of a woman stretching her arms towards her, smiling , calling her name out- the image she had seen in her dreams so much in the past slowly burned in the back of her brain, marking it as a effect of her imagination or a distant memory of one of the maids through the childish eyes she had before. Certainly it was impossible for her to still remember something, right?

Right?

Doflamingo looked at her sleeping face, completely oblivious to his thoughts. Lying to her was not a problem- he had planned how make her feel like she had never been wanted years ago, expecting questions like that to come to light sooner or later. The probability of the memories of her first two years of life that remained in her memories was almost zero; that was not a problem either.

The problem was that he didn't know where she got that kind of ideas.

Yue would soon be fifteen, having matured her powers as he had expected from the beginning, and by that time he had calculated that he would have wiped all kinds of questions about her identity as a person from her mind, or to have glued to her mind that she was destined to stay in that room until he decided it was safe enough and that it wouldn't happen the same things that happened with Law- the brat was a genius, but he used his freedom too much for Doflamingo's liking. He also wanted to ensure that no problems would start to appear like the ones with Baby 5. But it has been a couple of years since she started to ask things like that, and act kind of strangely.

She no longer looked at him expectantly as he left her room, and that was what he had always wanted, that she knew that she couldn't live. Since he had "found" her, he had taken it as making an animal get used to its cage, and now that he had achieved it after nearly fifteen years, he had to be happy, proud of himself. It was what he wanted.

But something was not right.

The way she smiled while saying good night, almost as she had been waiting for that moment all day.

She no longer looked out all the windows, only to the balcony.

The she unconsciously stared the flowers that stood on the railing even when the flowers were closed, almost as if waiting for it to move at any second.

It was not bad, but it was not good either.

Things had changed. Some of them how turned out exactly as he planned, others not so much.

Slowly, but noticeable.

Soon, it wasn't going to be enough to keep her in a glass box as a collectible doll.

"_Such a valuable piece must always be close to its owner_" He looked at the pictures spread on the ground, noticing a couple of scenes that he could remember even when it had been so many years. A wry smile crossed his lips, looking back at her "Don't you think so, Yue?"

* * *

**Aki: Fall.**


	8. Forbidden word

A/N: So, okay, this is the longest chapter yet, and seeing the reviews I have just one thing to say before you start to read this: Just... dont kill me after.

Disclaimer: I dont own one piece.

* * *

"They are too perfect" Yue looked the face of the person against whom her head was lying from under the book that she had raised above her head, feeling that even though he was talking to her, it was like he was not even there, since he was looking at something else. He was sitting on the floor with his back leaning against one of the sides of her bed, and as she used to do, she was using his leg as a pillow while he had the other one slightly raised- from where she was Yue had the impression that his eyes were unfocused, as if he were thinking of something that was really far away, almost as if it hadn't been his intention to speak in the first place. She followed his eyes, passing through the balcony doors and reaching the flowers at the gardener outside the room, slightly illuminated by the moonlight.

"You make it sound like that's something really bad " She tilted the face to the side , marking the page of the book as she closed it slowly, placing it over her stomach and allowing hands rest against the cover, which was already worn out from all the years she had passed reading it. Law had often offered to bring her a different one, but she had refused, saying that was her favorite.

"Have you ever lived it?"

"The what?"

"Something that's not perfect" Turning to him when she felt observed, Yue found that he was no longer looking at the flowers, now he was looking at her face, with an expression that looked a lot like the one he had the first time they met- She could remember it perfectly, almost as if it had been hours since then instead of eight years. The girl frowned slightly in confusion, not understanding why that kind of expression was on his face, but she answered anyway.

"What's 'perfect'?" Silence filled the room after her words left her mouth, and that only made Yue's frown to get deeper. The red eyed left the book that was on her hands in the floor as she sat, turning t her right quickly while stretched her legs in front of her. She lifted her face, feeling a little frustrated because of the difference that had grown between them over the years- she had never been taller than Law, but now the difference was more noticeable, and he didn't waste a single opportunity to remind her of that, a smirk always present in his face.

There was no hint of that smirk at the moment, and not even a single mocking gesture. He just stared at her the same way was before; like his mind was far away from the room even thought she had him in front of her.

"What is it, Law? You are strange today" Yue tilted her head to one side, looking for some sort of expression in the face of the other person, something that could tell her what was he thinking; but it was like watching a mask. That was what annoyed her about Law. Whenever he wanted, he could build a wall between him and the rest of the world, locking himself in his mind, a place where only he had access, but Yue supposed she was more worried than annoyed- lately, that mask appeared more and more frequently, and the moments when he would end up looking at some indefinite point in a wall became longer and more frequent. Law could fool everybody, but Yue was not about to fall into that trap.

"Nothing that a little girl has to worry about" Law let out a sigh, closing his eyes for a moment.

"I'm not a little girl anymore!"

"Oh, really? Because last time I checked, having sixteen is to still be a kid" He raised an eyebrow as a mocking gesture and he opened his eyes again, sending a feeling of relief all over her body. She answered the smile with a 'Jum' that was meant to sound annoyed, but the smile that appeared in her face anyway betrayed her completely. The 'young adult' let out a chuckle, noting her failed intent, and Yue's smile got even bigger, showing all her teeth.

"Don't say things like that just because you just turned eighteen" She stuck out her tongue, swaying from side to side, while Law contained another low chuckle that was slowly turning into a laugh. No matter what she said or how she wanted to act sometimes, her childish behavior was just something natural in her movements, and he doubted that at some point in her life it would change.  
"Show me your hands" He asked after a moment.

"What for?"

"Come on, just do it" Yue watched as got a hand inside his pocket, holding it in place as he waited for her to do as told. She stretched her two palms together, tilting her face with curiosity as Law got his hand out, closed, like he was holding something extremely small.

He dropped something into her open palms, looking at she got her hands closer to her face to observe the small object in detail, even though in his opinion there was not much to see- well, he guessed it was different for her. The moonlight made the small glass ball shine slightly- it was not bigger than a grape, and the material only made a really big contrast with the bright red small flower that was inside it, giving Yue the impression that it was floating. But what really attracted Yue was the fact that the flower was not completely red; its petals had small white long dots, as if someone had splashed white paint over the flower.

"It's a mutation" Commented Law, looking at it as well "You have never seen it in one of your flowers, right? You've never seen anything that is not perfect" He smiled sideways as she looked at the object, without removing her eyes off it for a second "This is not perfect, but that doesn't mean it's not okay"

"It's beautiful" She mumbled, kind of unable to say something else at the moment.

"Would you want to live it then?" After a moment, when the girl didn't understand what he was asking, she lifted her eyes from the object, meeting the eyes of the person who had been her only friend in all her life "Something that's not perfect? Something fragile, that cannot be assured, something that could even be dangerous"

"Huh?"

Law let out a sigh again, this time a little heavier.

Yue should have known at that moment that something was wrong.

"You're a good girl, Yue" He almost whispered, like he was saying it more to himself than to her, and though his eyes were in her direction, they were lost again, probably thinking of something that he would never be willing to tell her. Law was that kind of person, but he always had a reason for not telling her things "You really are"

The "_I 'm not a little kid_" died in her throat before she could even say it.

And that's when she knew something was, certainly, really wrong .

"Law?"

"You should go to sleep, it's getting late" He got up from the ground, putting his hands in his pockets as he walked with short steps towards the balcony doors. His shadow spread almost all over the room, covering part of her body even thought she had stood seconds after him. Yue looked at his back, a growing feeling of discomfort in her chest and her stomach, like she was falling into a black hole and she couldn't see the bottom at all.

"Ne, Law" He turned around for a moment, and she gave him a small smile, one that she hoped didn't look as nervous as she felt "Next time you come, I want you to bring me one of the books you wanted to bring before. This one… I had already read it lost of times" She tried to laugh naturally, extending the book that she held in her hands. The 'man' stared the green cover, the one that was extremely worn out, before stretching his arm to take it with one hand. He continued to stare at it for a moment before looking at her again.

His face was unrecognizable.

"Goodbye"

And the balcony door closed behind him.

It was a type of rule.

They had never actually spoken about it, but it was as if it was already wrote somewhere.

_That_ word was forbidden.

He never had said goodbye before, not once- he had always been "until later", no matter the circumstances, no matter how far he was going in one of his trips, or how dangerous his mission was going to be. He never said it.

"Law" She did what she could to swallow, making an attempt to not feel her throat as dry as she approached with trembling steps the balcony. She pressed her palms against the glass, watching him giving his back to her. Yue felt a cold sweat for a moment, and she didn't know why "Law!" She stretched her hand towards the door, taking the handle in her hands, trembling slightly because of the cold that the metal produced against her skin. But when she looked up, all that was left on the railing were the white flowers, fully bloomed.

She knew she couldn't call louder for him; Doffy was close enough to hear her if she did so.

So Yue took a really deep breath, and backed away from the door as if the glass burned her.

She was being ridiculous.

It was impossible that "goodbye" was _that_ kind of "goodbye"

"_He'll be back in a week_" She said to herself, picking up the small ball of glass she had left in the floor, closing her hand around it like her life depended on it "_He always does_"

* * *

The feeling that something was wrong didn't got out of her the next day, or the day after that, nor the day that followed that one. The knot in her throat and in her stomach didn't seem to go away; no matter how much she tried to calm down, not even by taking the tea or the soup that maids had prepared for her thinking that she was ill- how they were not going to think that? She had practically not eaten, and there were day she didn't even leave the bed at all, looking out the balcony like she was waiting for something.

_If only they knew_.

But they didn't know.

No one knew.

No one _could _know.

And that was why she couldn't ask anybody.

That was why she waited.

And waited.

And waited.

And waited.

But it didn't matter how much she waited like when she had been a little girl, the flowers pot didn't move from its place. It had not been a week, so she didn't want to panic or do something really stupid, like going out into the balcony to try and look for him. So she waited, and when the seven days passed she played the same song, the one that she always stayed to listen, the one that she played the night the met, but no one spoke to her when she finished.

She really didn't want to stand from the piano and walk into her room, but she knew that at some point she had to go. She even stayed outside the double door, breathing slowly, like it was difficult to breath. She closed her eyes as she took the first step inside, and when she opened them again, the first thing she caught sideways was the movement of the curtains.

The window was open.

A smile began to appear on her face as she turned it to look in that direction, but as quickly as it had appeared, it faded, simply erasing its own exiting.

She was sure that her face had gone from pale to translucent

"What's with that face, Yue?~ With that look I could almost think that you don't want to see me" She felt like her feet were nailed to the floor as she watched the man that was standing against the frame of the window, which were totally open, letting the cool breeze of the night inside the room. Yue shivered for a moment, perhaps because she had never actually feel the breeze, or maybe because of the smile that the man had on his lips as he played with the ball that had the flower inside "Almost like you were expecting someone else"

The knot in her throat loosened enough to say a word, and even then, the only thing that came out of her mouth was a whisper, that because of the silence of the room seemed to echo through the walls.  
"Doffy "

* * *

**Let me know what you think .**


	9. Like before

Disclaimer: I dont own One piece.

* * *

"I had noticed that lately there was something that kept you kind of… away from me, Yue" He encircled her, but Yue was completely frozen, feeling how inside was been demolished with every step she could hear. The emptiness in her stomach was big, and for the first time in her life her nerves did something nice for her, closing her throat with a knot that undoubtedly prevented her from saying something that she could regret later "And well, I couldn't allow- I_ can't_ allow it. You are very important to me, did you know that, right? So you can understand as well that I cannot stay still when something else attracts your attention" She felt how he stopped behind her back, probably leaning forward so she could hear his words- Yue didn't even move a muscle when she felt the words being whispered near her ear "When _someone else _gets your attention"

Law was on Doffy's favorites.

You didn't need to be a genius or live outside her room to actually know that, it was enough to listen for years and years the way Vergo pressed him even more than the other recruits, or to realize that even though he was not part of the Donquixote family he was still someone that was going to have a really important place- she was sure that the way he was forced to study was not normal at all.

She didn't' know what had happened to him or where he was at that moment- she didn't want to imagine it, but for whatever reason he had, she couldn't say his name if Doffy asked her to. She had heard about all the punishments that he got for just getting late to a lesson or leaving early to go and see her, and Yue didn't want to know what they might to Law if they knew he had broken _that _rule, the one that kept everyone away from her room- for a millisecond she wondered if that was the reason the rules were for, so she couldn't meet anyone.

She had asked many stupid things since she could remember- why she wasn't able to muster some courage and ask what really mattered, even for just one time?

It was too late to think about those things anyway.

"I just want you to tell me his name, only that" Doflamingo took her am to turn her towards him, smiling slightly as she lifted her face to see him straight in the eye. Yue pursed her lips, almost pressing them in a straight line, wanting to look at anything but her reflection in the sunglasses, but she didn't move a single centimeter, keeping her eyes in place. Doflamingo practically growled when there was no answer "I want you to tell me so I can find him and destroy every single part of his body, bone by bone"

There was no response, just silence.

When he released her arm Yue tripped over her own feet, falling in a sitting position on the floor, still with her eyes on his face, looking at the expression that only a few times she had seen on his face, and none of those times he had been upset with her- she felt terrible, at the same tie she felt of disgust at herself and guilt accumulated inside her with each passing second, although she had done absolutely nothing. What had been her mistake? To talk to someone? To smile when she was not with him? She didn't understand, she _couldn't _understand. Yue opened her mouth to defend Law even thought he was not saying anything directly to him, but she knew it was not a good idea to say something against something she had not hear, _yet_. She couldn't let Doffy know who the person who visited her was, no matter what.

Doflamingo said nothing for the moment, looking from above with a look that she couldn't understand like in the past, completely unknown to her because of the sunglasses. He turned from her, showing Yue his back as he walked around the room, throwing the crystal ball with the flower to the air a couple of times as she had seen from the beginning.

Seconds later Yue understood why the window was still open.

She could almost see the threads that closed around the glass, holding it up as a crack appeared on its surface due to the pressure. She closed her eyes before the crustal broke into pieces, but the sound reached her ears, and she could almost imagine the red flower falling to the ground with the pieces of glass that held it in place. A thud was heard later- he had probably stepped on it.

She opened her eyes, feeling that the tears wanted to find away to get out of her.

When silence was all he received as an answer for his actions, Doflaming turned around, expecting much. But what he found was the only possibility he had not been prepared to see. She looked at him from the floor with her hands turned into fists at her sides, lips in a straight line, and eyes swollen in tears. There were not muffled cries or silent sobs- nothing that guilt could provoke.

Only tears.

Tears and sadness.

But not fear.

"Are you scared?" He moved towards her, looking at Yue intently, waiting some kind of movements that could indicate that she wanted to get away from him. Even when he smirked she found no movements, kneeling in front of her as he reached over, placing a hand on top of her head "Sorry, I got carried away a bit"

The hand on her head passed to her shoulder, while he got close enough to pass his other arm under her knees, lifting her body with great ease, almost as if she weighed the same as a feather- for someone like him that was probably what she weighted.

Yue found herself lying on her bed on one of her sides, with the giant feather coat over her, completely covering her body and protecting her from the imaginary cold.

"Let's forget all about this accident and pretend it never happened" Doflamingo moved the locks of hair that covered her swollen eyes with the tips of his fingers, then rubbed her thumb over her face with a smile on his face as he sat at the edge of the bed, by her side. The fact that it was not the wide smile that she was used to see didn't help, the small smile that was on his lips that reminded her of the weight of the situation "When you wake up tomorrow, everything will be as usual. It was not your fault, that's for sure, you were simply tricked. I'm not upset Yue, don't think I am"

Yue closed her eyes.

She had done nothing wrong to annoy him.

Those moments couldn't have been something bad, couldn't have been something that was not right.

She wanted to believe that everything believe him; believe that it was the same as before, as if nothing ever happened.

Yue really wanted to believe it.

"You're a good girl, Yue" She knew it had been a whisper, but it seemed like he had said loud enough for the echo to ring in her ear at the same time she felt as the man placed a hand on top of her head, like usual "You are my good girl"

_"You're still a kid" Law smirked , looking from where he had his head on her lap "But I'm sure you're not as harmless as you look"_

"Forever" Whispered Doflamingo .

Nothing ever got to be the same as before.

* * *

**Okay, so, lets make a deal. You give me reviews, and I ****_swear_**** over the name of everything that is dear to me that I will make you cry with the next chapter.**


	10. No matter what

A/N: This is the saddest thing I have ever written in my life, even if its the shortest chapter of this fic.

**INSTRUCTIONS: When you star reading this, you NEED to look for the saddest soundtrack you know, and listen to it. I wrote it and read it while listen to Sadness and Sorrow from Naruto. Tell me which one you choose!**

**Curious fact:**

**Being this the last chapter of the, just to put a name to it, "first season", it was almost the exact same amount of words as the first chapter. **

* * *

**_Ne, Law_**

"She is ready, young master" Doflamingo turned his head to the maid's voices, watching as the doors opened, allowing the teenager to come into the room. The high shoes that she often refused to use because she said they hurt her feet touched the floor gently, barely making a sound, while the black dress that reached her knees, completely covering them, practically made her skin glow- the almost white skin that had never been touched directly by the sun. Her hands were at her sides and her head was still in its place, letting the red jewel that always hung from her neck shine.

Just like a little doll.

Just like it should be.

_**Do you remember the first time we met? **__**Or the first time we saw the fireworks together? You remember all the stories you told me about?**_

"Fufufufufufu, perfect" He got up from the couch, walking with one hand inside his pocket. Even with the high heels she couldn't reach his shoulders, not that many people actually could any way, though it was probable that she wouldn't grow much from now on. He carefully observed the details that seemed almost to overdo her outfit- the earrings and the bracelets. Although, maybe it was because of the fact that it was the first time he saw her like that, so it was just normal to think that she looked different. He smirked "Don't you think so, Yue? Do you like the dress?"

She nodded slowly, staring at the floor.

_**I was really happy.**_

"The last ones just got here. All of them are at the garden, Doffy. As ordered" Yue watched sideways as Vergo was practically standing on the other side of the room, with his usual way of standing, with both arms hidden behind his back. She was surprised that nothing was glued to his face.

"Are you ready to meet some people, Yue?"

Vergo opened the door, standing straight next to the wood as he watched her, or more like he examined her. Yue could also feel the looks of the maids, who probably were glancing at her from their position behind her. Doffy pressed a hand against her back, probably pushing her forward.

_**Do you remember when you asked me if I had lived something imperfect? Actually, I did. But that is my secret, that's why I didn't tell you. **_

"What was his name?" She asked suddenly, looking up, without stopping her movements towards the door "The one that betrayed you" She clarified when Doflamingo lifted an eyebrow as he was asking her something.

"Fufufufufu, no one you need to worry about"

"I want to know" She insisted "The people I'm going to meet probably are going to talk about it"

_**Would have you stayed if I had said that you are the imperfection in my life? That you are the thing that I appreciate the most?**_

She knew what the answer would be even before she heard the name- she had had enough time to think about it and realize what really happened to him since she heard Doffy talking about it at breakfast the day before. She bit her tongue, keeping an impassive face, hoping that it looked disinterested, squeezing her hands while hiding them in the skirt dress. She was squeezing so hard that she felt as her nails dug into the skin of her palms.

Yue looked through the open door, meeting an exact replica of her door across the hallway, she was certain that the door was the one to Doffy's room. Her breathing quickened with every step she took to the door, feeling her hands trembling slightly.

_**Ne, Law**_

"Law" He said in the end, walking besides her as she stepped out of the room- the first step since they had come to the castle seven years ago "Trafalgar Law"

_**Would you have taken me with you?**_

Yue never again opened the balcony windows.

She couldn't let Doffy know. Not now, not ever.

No matter what.

* * *

I really tried to write something that could make people cry. So... did you cry? XD

**YOUR ATTENTION PLEASE (If I could put this words on red, I would)**

This is something like the end of an Arc or a season, and what comes next would probably determine the story, but petition of the people have gone from one extreme to the other, so I decided to open a **votation. **It will las **two days, **starting from the moment I publish this, and basically all you have to do is leave a **review **giving me the answer for the following question:

**Who do you want Yue to stay with? Law or Doflamingo?**


	11. Sorry (Not a AN)

Actually, this is not my fvaorite chapter- I mean, I like how I could write it but I dont LOVE it, I just hope that you'll like it. You will realize who won when you read this chapter. Please tell me what you think.

Disclaimer: I do not own One piece.

* * *

"They are very pretty!"

"Yeah" Yue smiled a little, resting her arms against the railing of the balcony from where yhey could see the rest of the island, watching how each and every one of the trees that surrounded the villa were illuminated by the bright artificial colors. Light green. Electric Blue. Purple that was almost pink. The colors and the sound completely filled the sky, shadowing for moments even the stars themselves "They really are"

"Ne, Yue-chan"

"Yes?"

"You like them a lot, right? And they are for your birthday" Sugar turned her face towards the person that stood besides her, absently swinging her legs over the edge of the railing she was sitting on.

"Why do you ask, Sugar? You know I really like them, we have seen them together the last two years" She nodded slowly, looking at the 'little girl' without understanding, tilting her face to one side to have a better look. It was really surprising how she had changed nothing in those years

"Then why whenever you see them, you look so sad?"

It was something that Yue didn't expect at all.

The young woman didn't answer, trying to find a coherent thing to say that didn't end up ruining the two years of acting that she had managed to maintain. But when she opened her mouth, waiting for something intelligent to come out of it, she had to close it again. Sugar's curious eyes didn't leave her for a moment, so Yue resigned herself to say anything stupid and just looked down, leaving her eyes fixed permanently on the ground. An even bigger explosion caught the other one's attention, making Sugar turn around, but something that she could see from the corner of her eye got her attention.

"Ne, Yue-chan, are you cold? Your hands are shaking!"

"Huh?"

Yue looked up without understanding her, following Sugar's eyes , watching her palms hanging slightly off the rail. Even with the almost blinding light coming from the sky, she could see what she meant, the slight movement of her hands, like it she had constant chills. Yue raised her arms and bringing her palms to her eye level, she carefully watched them. After a moment she turned to Sugar again.

"It's nothing" She smiled sideways, wrapping her hand with the other one, keeping them still against her chest "Probably is just because of the excitement" She looked at the fireworks again, as if she suddenly had remembered their meaning- she wasn't lying, but it was not like she really knew the answer. Probably it wasn't something she needed to worry about, anyway "After all, you don't get to be eighteen every day"

**AT SOME PART OF THE GRAND LINE**

They were small things.

They were things that everyone in his crew wondered at some point, no matter what; they _always_ asked the same questions. He had noticed that a few months after they 'got' the submarine, when his crew exceeded twenty mans, when he re-entered the Gran Line after two years of getting prepared as far as possible of the New World, even having gone to his native island in the North Blue.

He was not the type of person who explained what he decided to do, never gave reasons for his actions because he never felt the need to do so, and he probably never would, so for that reason they always tried to guess his motives, and no matter what kind of things they imagine or how many options they presented, Law never said they were wrong.

However, he never said they were right either.

"Why Bepo wears an orange suit?"

_He is captain's second in command._

"Why does he like red so much?"

_He was called the Surgeon of death for something._

And on nights like those, when he was looking at the colors that rose in the night sky, having stopped to buy them himself in the last island where they stopped, the most recent members of the crew had the same questions in their mind about the the same moment when they noticed their captain's strange behavior. All the members that had been with him from a long time, like Bepo, told them that he did the same thing once a year, and that it was the second time they had seen him do that.

It was the only thing that they never dared to ask him, because the face that their captain had that night as he watched the lights of different color, held and expression that they had never seen in him before, and it probably meant that the topic was not to be touch, _ever_.

So, like all those times in the past, they made up their own answer.

"Why does he likes fireworks so much?"

_Who doesn't like fireworks?_

Law didn't say they were wrong.

Nor did he say they were right.

Because it was something that they couldn't easily understand, something that would probably sound stupid out of his mind.

Because that was his way of saying "sorry", even when she was not around.

* * *

And the winner is Law!


	12. Much simpler

Disclaimer: I dont own One Piece.

* * *

"I was really careful on just looking for the documents that could be a little… compromising" She tried to choose the most appropriate word, tilting her face to one side as she shook the folder that she held in one hand "I doubt they even noticed me inside the office, that creepy man was way too busy on the stage. It was easy to get out of there; I just had to pretend to be a terrified spectator"

"_Fufufufufufu perfect. You did a really good job, Yue. I was getting bored of that business anyway_" An I-told-you-so smile crossed the girl's lips. She couldn't wait to actually say it in his face.

"It was pretty entertaining too" She smiled sideways, recalling what she had heard as she left the auction house "_That Strawhat Luffy seems to be a really interesting person, it's a shame that I couldn't see him_" She laughed a bit, keeping it to herself "Want me to burn them?" She asked, looking at the folder.

"_Yes, that would be the best. You can come back now_"

"Well, I'd love to, but…" She looked down from her position on top of one of the roots of a tree whose number she had forgotten. From there she could see the expositions in all their glory, even those that were far away from that Grove, and although she was pretty high she was still able to hear people screaming, and she could see them running around, probably realizing that something was wrong when the first tree fell- or maybe it was when they heard that someone had beaten a Tenryuubito. Yue grimaced. Kizaru was definitely as powerful as she had heard "The marines are everywhere, and I also think that I saw Bartholomew Kuma while walking away from the auction house. Ah, did I mention before that Kizaru is here?"

"_Don't pay attention to them; it's likely that soon everything will go crazy. Not just that place, but the rest of the world as well_"

"Really?" She frowned, resting the arm that held the folder on top of her raised knee after leaving the documents by her side.

"_They should announce the execution of Shirohige's commander at anytime now_" A laugh crossed the air, even though its owner was not present. Yue's mouth opened slightly in surprise, processing the information while sitting a little bit straighter "_What I would give to look at what you are looking right now_"

"You knew about it?"

"_You offend me, Yue, of course I knew, even before the other Shichibukai"_ Despite his words, Yue could hear another laugh from the other side of the line. She stuck her tongue out, knowing that the Den Den Mushi she had could copy her movements. An even louder laugh was heard after that "_Anyway, it shouldn't be a problem for you to come back. I would go and bring you back myself, but there are some issues I have to fix before I go to Marineford, so be a good girl as always and wait for Buffalo, it shouldn't be long before he reaches Shabondy_"

The young woman automatically looked up at the sky, half expecting to see the man's big body somewhere. Yue sighed with relief when she saw nothing, and looked down again, tilting her face as she watched the marines running under the roots, probably not even noticing her presence.

"Hai" She said after a moment.

"_Good girl_"

And the call ended.

Yue opened the bag that was tied to her felt, leaving the mini Den Den Mushi inside and closing the bag while she looked down again. There were no marines left. She then lifted her eyes, stretching her arms and sighing a little after a second- it was a shame; she had been really excited to be able to come to Shabondy. The bubbles were nice, and she didn't have the chance of walking even half of the Archipielago. She had passed weeks, almost months, practically begging to cross the Red Line, frustrated by and tired of the unpredictable weather of the New World, and she had almost cried of joy when Doflamingo agreed, after lots of begging, to let her have a small mission as close to the New World as possible.

But Yue knew it was not safe to be there now- another explosion could be heard.

"I don't think it would be nice if I happen to find Kizaru" She mumbled, rising and trying to shake the dust of the back of the black shorts she was wearing. Her hand reached for the long fabric that hung around the neck of the gray vest that was on top of a plain White shirt. Yue placed the dark red fabric on top of her hair, moving her hands automatically while organizing it around her head so it would cover her face, except for her eyes "Ah, but she doesn't know me, so I'll be fine" She smiled, letting the little of the fabric that was left over her chest when she finished. She bent down, taking the folder again "I only have to leave this inside of one of those buildings on fire, then I just have to stay put and wait for Buffalo"

"A supernova!" The yell caught her attention, and looking down Yue discovered that another group of marines were running under the root she was sitting on. The word 'supernova' caught her attention almost immediately, making Yue frown while following them with her eyes- it couldn't be… right? "We have seen his submarine! Quick, he is probably already preparing to leave!"

One second.

Two.

Three.

Yue laughed at the air, though it sounded more like a frustrated huff.

"You _really_ hate me" She sarcastically smiled, looking up, at whoever was watching her at that moment. They were probably laughing at her misfortune. She laughed again, in a lower voice, but it was a way to distract her mind and her eyes, which were becoming more and more crystalline. She breathed deeply, slowly, shaking her head a little as the stepped back and turned around.

That was not her problem.

"_I have to burn this folder_"

**That was not her problem.**

"_And when I get back I'll make fun of Doffy- oh, no, he is somewhere else_"

**_That was not her problem._**

"_So I guess I'll be with Baby 5, maybe I can get her to take me somewhere interesting_"

**_That was not her problem._**

"_My life would be so much __**simpler**__ if I could hate him like the rest of the world seems to hate him_" She mentally groaned "_So, but __**so**__ simple_"

She left the folder on the floor again.

She'll come later.

Yue turned around, looking down at the distance that was between where she was standing and the ground- if it wasn't for the fact that she had already tried that method before, that fall guaranteed an almost instantaneous death. It was in moments like those in which she wondered what would happen if her powers failed, or if she got distracted enough to not be able to hold her own weight, even if it was just for a second.

But a second was enough.

She smirked at that.

And then jumped.

* * *

If anything, Law was sure that whoever was suicidal enough to offer his own body for experiments, deserved to be treated with respect or be called a complete stupid and ignorant person. But somehow he couldn't really think about that Shichibukai that way- could he even be called a Shichibukai? Now he/it was a formidable weapon, and Law was sure that, while his pride was hurt by being exhausted after fighting what appeared to be a robot, Eustass Kid's pride was even more hurt than his.

And that was something that could make him laugh for days and days in a row without getting tired for a second, although that probably was not the best moment to do so.

Who would have known that they would understand each other so much?

But more importantly, what kind of things went through Mugiwara no Luffy's mind to make him such a suicidal person? Even if the guy had brought him quite a number of problems, he couldn't help but be intrigued by such a person, nor he could deny that it was fun t watch him fight- now, what Law didn't found fun at all, was the way they were running towards their submarine as fast as they could, not wanting to meet with the Admiral, or any other marine for that matter.

He even had thought that reaching the submarine, they would be safe.

Law felt really stupid for being so naive.

"Captain, the Marines are here!"

Law cursed under his breath, not even wanting to turn around to confirm it. He made a mental recount of his men, nodding to himself when he we was sure they all were there. Gun shots were heard, and it didn't take to be a genius or to be watching to know that they were in their direction.

"Prepare to dive!"

"Aye, Captain!"

Law's jaw tensed a bit, yet he smiled.

If we were not ready to face that kind of things, he could have never become a pirate in the first place.

"Damn, they 're too persistent!"

"Captain, we are rea-"

"_Zero!_"

Law blinked in confusion, trying to understand what meant the words that had interrupted his second in command. The exclamations of the part of the crew that were still on deck did nothing but confuse him more. He turned around, expecting anything but what he actually found. He would have thought that it was Eustass work, but the fact that not only weapons were in the air, but people as well, eliminated that option.

"There is someone there! Akuma no mi user, probably!" Yelled Penguin, and all of the presents including his captain looked at the direction he had pointed. Passing the floating body's, which was hard not to stare at, there was someone standing on top of the roots, apparently watching them. For Law, it was not difficult to locate the person, but the hard part came in trying to who it was, taking in consideration that person was not just hiding his or her face behind some kind of fabric, but that the person had decided to look up at the sky, as if waiting for something that was supposed to come from it "That's the one who did it! Maybe is power over the air!"

"What!?"

The person lowered his eyes, only for one second, looking towards the submarine again.

But a second was enough.

Even more gun shots were heard, and the person turned around. She then jumped from the root to the ground as more marines approached the shore, stopping only for moments when they noticed their comrades raised in the air, moving from side to side apparently without control, giving her enough time to run under the bodies, looking towards the sky again, like she was really looking for something.

"Captain, we got to go!" Bepo called again, absolutely nervous, but the man didn't seem to pay attention to his words "Captain?" The bear went into panic when the man simply made his way to the railing, apparently trying to have a better view of what was happening on land "I know you don't see a power like that every day, but you really shoul-"

"It's not air" Now they were probably looking at him like he was crazy, but little Law noticed at that precise moment "Its gravity" Another gunshot was heard, and as if that bothered him, Law tightened his grasp on the railing he was holding, to the point where his knuckles turned completely white.

"Captain?"

"Room" He listened as the crew called his name a couple of times, without understanding what he was doing, but he ignored them, raising his hand. He opened his 'zone' as much as he could, only stopping when she stepped on the floor inside the sphere, realizing too late what she had done "Shambles"

He looked at the place on his left where there was a floating bubble before, only a few feet above the deck. Before the blue circle disappeared a body took the bubbles place, falling to the ground with a really strong 'TUD'. If she really was who he thought, she probably was going to kill him later for that, but until he was sure he couldn't show any sign of weakness- the way he placed his hand, close to his sword's handle, told his crew to be prepared for anything. He listened as the Marines fell to the ground, screaming in pain probably because of the fall, but he didn't turn around to be sure; he could feel the sub moving under his feet, so they were moving away from the shore.

"This is going to hurt tomorrow..."

If he knew that voice, Law wouldn't really know it because of the fabric that hid most of her face- she had her hands on the floor, apparently trying to lift herself from the ground, probably failing because of the impact of her body in the ground. The silver braid slipped to rest on her shoulder, leaving its position behind her back, where it had been practically hidden until now.

There was only one person who had that hair color.

He practically threw his sword to Bepo, who was just attentive enough to catch it. Law crossed the distance between them with practically two strides, helping her up when he get to her side, holding her elbows with his hands as he listened how she complained under her breath. She some small wounds on her arms, and it was most likely that she had been unable to completely dodge the bullets, even thought he thought she did.

He breathed deeply, slowly, keeping the air in his lungs for a moment.

Of the thousands of questions that haunted his mind, the only thing that he said when he let out the air was one word, and it was almost without realizing it. A simple word that could tell him immediately if the situation was real or not.

"Yue?"

She stopped her complaining and stayed in complete silence, like she had just remembered that someone else was present.

Slowly, as if trying to avoid it, Yue looked up, and for the second time that day Law found the red that unconsciously he had been seeking to replace those last three years- How many days he passed remembering those same eyes, looking at him with fear before he left Doflamingo? How many times had he imagined the scene in his head, but with a different result? How many times?

He had lost count.

The fabric slid to the floor when she pulled the hanging edge, revealing her stunned face. She had change, but she had not at the same time- In the lines where he found maturity at first, seconds later showed the childish innocence that plagued his memories. Law smirked slightly at her open mouth, looking at the deck and then looking at the piece of land where she had been before, the one that started to look rather small as they moved, and then she turned to look at him again, as if she didn't really understand.

She stepped away from him, letting go of his grip without breaking eye contact with, an expression that suggested she could start crying at any moment. She looked around, at the crew she didn't know, taking another step back, her body language showing her nerves. The supernova slightly raised one hand towards her, trying not to scare her.

"Yue"

Her name seemed to bring her back to reality, making eye contact with him again.

Her eyes softened a moment Law and visibly relaxed.

His guard was down for just a second.

Contrary to all his expectations, the impact on his cheek that caused a little of pain seconds later made him realize that she kept doing things that he would never ever expect. His crew astonished eyes told him that it had not been a mistake, and she had really done it. Law looked at Yue's hand, which was still raised in the air, and then he looked at her face, noticing that the eyes that had once been smooth now showed deep anger.

She had slapped him.

And yes, he probably deserved it.

* * *

Please leave review!


	13. Wrong

So, this is a **FLASH BACK. **Who can guess what happens with Yue?

Disclaimer: One Piece.

* * *

_She felt light-headed when she regained consciousness. __She slowly opened her eyes, seeing blurry at first, so she rubbed her eyes with one hand, stretching a little in the process, a deep yawn coming from her lips. Her senses returned to her after a while, feeling how her body was on top of a bed, and starting to be able to capture the sounds around her. The sound of the waves came first, so she could say they hadn't return to the castle, they still were at the Villa- Yue looked at the clear blue sky through the giant window that was on her left. Someone had opened it, so the breeze blew gently against her skin, feeling the room with the scent of salt water. _

_She could hear another thing, and after many attempts of waking up properly, she could identify the sound. _

_It was Doffy's voice._

_"I want to talk to Caesar. __**Now**__"_

_Yue blinked several times in a row._

_He was upset._

_He was extremely upset._

_It was likely that Doffy thought she was still asleep , it was the only explanation she could think of to why he was screaming that way- She could even hear it from where she was, lying on her bed, while the man was in the adjoined room with a closed door between them. She tried to remember how she to bed; she had been with Baby 5 after her training, that she could remember, but then there was absolutely nothing. Yue slowly sat on top of the bed, making sure she was totally fine, pushing aside a couple of stuffed animals in the process. She unconsciously hugged the white bear that she always brought with her when she left the castle, in cases like those where she was not going to sleep in her own room, tilting her face to one side while trying to order her memories. _

_Had she fallen asleep? She remembered being very tired when Baby 5 accompanied her to her room, but was that enough to really fall asleep just like that? It was unlikely, and it had never happened before, but she couldn't find another explanation. She looked down, confirming that she was in her pajamas, so the maids were involved. She had opened her eyes no more than ten minutes ago and no one was there, even thought she was sure she heard people talking around her, or it had been a dream?_

_In either case, why Doffy was even using the Den Den Mushi of her room? His room was across the hall, was the matter so urgent that he had couldn't just cross the hallway to his own room?_

_She had heard the name 'Ceaser' only a few times, so she had no specific knowledge about the person. Normally Doffy's business 'partners' had strange names, or names that it was hard not to know, like the name 'Kaido'- now __**that **__was a name she had heard a lot both in the castle and in the Villa, one of the Yonkou. She didn't know what kind of business they had, but she didn't want to know either. _

_The door opened, catching her attention and as she placed her eyes on the man who entered the room. __She looked odd when he didn't have his coat, and she couldn't look for it with her eyes in the other room since the man closed the door with a loud 'TUD'. Doflamingo just stood in that place for a moment, noticing that she was awake, and both his behavior and his face were so strange that Yue opened her mouth to ask if something was wrong._

_But the serious expression he had on his face was such that Yue didn't have the strength to utter a single word. She watched in complete silence and nervousness as he approached the bed, sitting on the edge while letting out a sigh that as strange as it was, sounded frustrated. When had he, Donquixote Doflamingo, demonstrated frustration while she was in his presence? In all her life, exactly? That definitely was something that she needed to be concerned about. _

_The silence that followed the sigh was a tense one, but she didn't dare to try and break it, getting a really bad feeling. Even if he had his glasses on, she could tell that the man's eyes were lost, but his frown pulled her out of any doubt, showing that his frustration probably reached the point of annoying him that way. She hugged the bear tighter against her chest when he turned at her, keeping the aire in her lungs almost without noticing it, expecting anything- had she done something those day? No that she remembered, but surely she had done nothing to deserve a scold. Why was he acting so strange?_

_"Yue" The tone he used to say her name made the girl squeeze her lips as hard as she could, trying to imagine what he was thinking at that time, but it was simple impossible, and the words he said after that did nothing but worry her even more. What she could see now was probably accumulated fatigue that he never showed, it was frustration, and deep there was something she could identify as anger "You need to know something"_

**_"_****_Since when is that happening?" She looked at the man that was sitting next to her whiout understanding what he meant, following his eyes until it reached her hands. The content of the cup she was holding moved slightly from one side to the other, making her realize that her hand was shaking. Yue stared at it for a few seconds before leaving the cup on top of the table in a quick movement, extending the palms of her hands in front of him so she could see them better. It was slightly, but it was still there. _**

**_"_****_I haven't noticed until now" She blinked a few times, closing and opening them for a few moments. She shrugged after that, resting it importance, reaching a piece of cake the servants had brought for the snack time "I'm sure it's nothing big, maybe I'm just tired"_**

_She remembered that. It was the first scene that first came to her mind when she finished listening to what he had to say- it had been after he forced her to accompany him to the meeting of the Shichibukai._

_She had almost empty eyes as she looked at the man beside her, who watched her movements, probably expecting some kind of strong reaction from her, although it didn't seem she would be reacting anytime soon. She, on the other hand, was slowly processing the information, recalling moments in the last year where she should have noticed that something was wrong._

"There is someone that is going to start looking for a way to stop it" She vaguely hears what he said "He

_**will **__stop it. I guarantee it" She was also vaguely aware that he growled a little._

It was not something that appeared just last year, she realized.

_In the last three years of her life, each and every of the times someone had noticed it she had mistaken it for something natural- she never bothered to stop and pay attention to it, even when it was not the first time it happened. He really thought it was simple fatigue. _

_She held the bear tighter. _

**_She had been wrong. _**


	14. Moment

A/N: And this, ladies and gentlemen (if any man can actually stand this fic) is the LONGEST chapter I have written for this fic. **I especially want to dedicate this to all those persons who wanted Yue to 'explode' I just hope they like it!**

A/N: English is not my first language, and this is, as I have said before, the longest chapter yet, so PLEASE be patient with any grammatical mistakes, it is quite likely to find some.

Disclaimer: One piece belongs to me.

PS: How do you imagine their relationship? I mean, some say that sweet in 'their own way', but what does it mean? I don't know.

Happy new year!

* * *

"Captain" Law turned to his left, looking as Bepo walked out of the door and into the deck "I brought the kit you asked for" He held up the white box that he had in his hands, taking quick, nervous looks at the other person present in the deck. Law smirked at that.

"Thanks, Bepo" The man gave his nodachi to his second in command when he took the box in one hand, stepping away from the wall he had been leaning against. The bear doubted a moment if to take it or not, watching as his captain turned around when he did, looking at the railing in front of him. Bepo looked over his shoulder at the girl that sat in front of Law, the one that his captain was probably watching as she just sat there in the floor.

Yue hadn't moved from her position in basically all the time she had spent in the submarine, which have not dive because she refused to enter in a restricted space with _him. _To say that the crew was amazed at how their captain had just smiled at the girl's words would be an understanding; apparently he was enjoying the situation. He even ordered them to remain on the surface as they left the archipelago- after all, he was the one how refused to take her to shore when she asked him to do so.

"Why are your hands shaking so much?" She didn't look up- she refused to do it, nor did she move a single centimeter from her place. The only thing she actually did was to held her hands tightly, hiding them between her knees so they couldn't be seen by him. Yue bit the inside of her cheek as hard as she could, mentally cursing whoever was up there for hating her so much; if it wasn't that, she was sure that someone was at least infinitely amused with her situation "Are you scared of me?" She bit her cheek harder, almost tasting blood.

For anyone who didn't know her, Yue's face could pass for a perfectly neutral mask. But if she thought he was going to fall for something like that, she was extremely wrong- Although Law knew it was not _possible_ for her to be afraid of him after slapping him with all her might across the face, and even if he knew her hands were shaking because of something else, he just couldn't keep those words for himself, smirking when, where others saw a completely neutral face, he saw a slight frown and lips pressed into a thin line to prevent herself from saying a word to him.

It did work, she didn't answer him.

He sat across from her, opening the kit at his side. Law quickly located what he needed at the moment, and with a quick movement of hands that Yue couldn't neither see nor prevent or fight, he grabbed one of her wrists and pulled her arm slightly towards him, holding it in place when its owner tried to get it back. With the same calm face, he reached over the kit for the things he had seen before disinfecting the wounds that adorned her skin- it had acquired a slightly tan, probably the result of being able to walk under the sun.

The man frowned slightly, looking at her face sideways. She kept looking away from him, her frown more noticeable, probably frustrated because she couldn't get her arm back.

"Are you going to tell me what were you doing in Shabondy or you are just going to keep looking at other way as the brat I'm starting to think you still are?" Maybe that was not the best choice of words, but if annoying her was the only way of make her talk, it was more than worth a try. He had tried soft words before, calling her names several times, but it had not worked. He was still thinking the same thing from when she had slapped him: He probably deserved it.

The hand he held in one of his closed in a fist. And at first, he really thought she was not going to answer.

"I was on a mission" he mumbled after a moment, and Law almost let a chuckle escape from his lips at the almost pouty expression she had, probably realizing that she had no other choice but answer him if she wanted to get something in return.

"They send you to missions now?" The smile was still there, even though he could hear the faint echo of his crew voices nearby- they were probably pilling up at the door to watch them without being much noticed "That's pretty impressive" He lifted his eyes from his work, finding her eyes and holding her gaze for a few seconds "I've always said that you just can't be was harmless as you look" The looked at the bandages again.

"Many things have changed since the last time we saw each other" She mentally cursed herself for answering at something that was not a question in the first place. She had pictured it as a goal: Don't talk more than necessary. Then why the hell she just couldn't stay quite? "_I will not forgive him, I will not forgive him, I will not forgive him, I will not forgive him_" But for some reason she really couldn't understand, the more she repeated those words in her mind, the less likely it looked, but she was not about to admit it.

"Yes, I know" He nodded slowly "I had it pretty clear when I saw you out of your glass cage" She practically glared at him. Bad idea to bring that topic to discussion, and worst way to ask what he wanted without really saying it "Okay, sorry, if you insist on calling _that _a room I'm no one to say anything against it"

"I think I'm better now" She practically ripped her arm from his hands, bringing her hand close to her chest in a protective gesture. Law, for a moment, could see the slight twitch of her lips when her muscles moved, probably resenting the injury even though it was disinfected and covered by bandages "Thanks for the treatment" She added after a moment "Can you take me back to shore now?"

"No" His answer was direct and without any kind of preamble, so Yue couldn't help but to let out a low growl of frustrating, throwing slightly her head back with her eyes closed "Not yet" He added after a second, analyzing the development of the expressions that crossed his childhood friend's face. It was fun to see that again, nostalgic.

"Why not?" Yue groaned, looking at him sideways.

"I want to talk to you"

"This is ridiculous" She mumbled- had he gone mad after all those years? Or he had acquired a rather absurd sense of taste in his journey? She pressed the bridge of her nose with her fingers for a moment, taking deep breaths. It was Law she was talking to, and something that probably hasn't change at all was how stubborn he was "Okay" She sighed, lowering her arms and looking at him "So? What you want to talk about?"

"Why such a cold attitude?" Law frowned, closing the kit with one hand without even looking at it.

"Are you _serious_?" Her mouth opened slightly. That man had to be _kidding_. A look into his eyes and she knew he wasn't "Do you _really_ have the _guts_ to ask me that?" Law raised an eyebrow at her words, but she ignored it, again pressing the bridge of her nose, hard, thinking aloud without caring about him for a second " Of course you have them, you've probably never stopped to think what happened after you left"

" We both know to where this is going to take us" When Yue lowered her hand , Law caught her eyes and held them firmly, almost daring her to look away "At some point we have to talk about it"  
" And I happen to think that we do not have to" She mumbled under her breath. The serious look of Law only made things worse, and she tried to look away , convinced that it would make everything easier.

"Why not?"

"Because once you left it clear that what you did was not my problem, I don't think I need you to remind me that, after all it is totally true; it was not and is not my problem" Yue pressed her hands against the floor, trying to calm the shaking that she was sure was present "If you are worried about me telling _him_, you don't have to worry, I had not tell anyone since I was allowed to go out of my room. And if you are curious, that was three years ago, a couple of days after you left" She bit her tongue, cursing herself for having said more than necessary.

"Did something happen?" He raised an eyebrow, but his expression was serious. And unfortunately, Yue knew exactly what he meant, but the words touched a really deep part that she had long tried to ignore.

That if something had_ happened_?

The memory of Vergo opening the door of her room came to her mind, but after that the picture of the sphere falling to the ground in pieces was the only think Yue could think about, she could even hear the loud TUD that Doffy's shoes had done when he stepped over the flower.

Daily workouts from morning until late at night, so that she was not allowed to have a single moment of rest for a full year.

All the nights she had spent sleepless looking out the windows of the balcony, the door firmly closed, hugging the white bear than even when most of her stuffed animals were gone, it was still there in her bed.

The white flowers that she had refused to return to see when bloomed, no matter what.

Hours and hours of fireworks that she tried not to listen, locking herself in the bathroom and sitting in the tub with the water running, wetting her clothes until someone came to get het, pulling her out so she could enjoy her _birthday_.

Her hands shaking, the countless hours she expended sleeping, Doflamingo's frustrated face as he realized that his experiment was not perfect and at that point it showed failures- failures he didn't even know if he could fix.

_That if something had happened_?

"No" Though his eyes were clear, she could see herself perfectly reflected in them, and Yue just hoped that her own eyes did not look as empty as she thought she had seen in her reflection "Nothing at all"

After what seemed an eternity, Law sighed, closing his eyes and being the first one to break the eye contact. Yue 's shoulders relaxed while pressing her back further against the railing, feeling exhausted for no apparent reason.

"Are you trying to say that your life has been perfect the last three years?"

_Yes_

The words were on the tip of her tongue.

She just had to open her mouth and speak.

Just had to say that and it would be the same as in the past. He would go and she wouldn't see him again- he would leave her behind, and Yue would act as if it never happened in the first place. Just as she had tried to do three years ago.

It was only a word.

"No"

She realized too late what she had said. But at the same time she realized that she didn't regret in the least to have said it, though he was looking at her with surprise written on his face and in his eyes.

Even if it was for only one time, she wanted to be completely honest .

"You don't have to ask me disguised questions anymore Law, I can understand now" She almost whispered, shaking her head slowly "Therefore, my answer is always going to be the same"

And Law _smiled_.

"Then join my crew"

The silence and the tension between the two could easily be cut with a butter knife.

If three years ago she would have given the same answer as now, he would have made the same proposition. Nothing would have been the same as before, and all the "what if" the two of them had imagined could have been real- her face would probably be in a Wanted poster, she probably would have been his second in command, or she simply would have been satisfied with just being at the submarine. She probably would have known sooner what was the rain, or the night breeze, maybe her feet would have never been in pain because of the hours and hours of wearing heels, might never have had used extravagant dresses, or she would have simply known what was the 'imperfection' he wanted to show her.

It would have been perfect.

Then Yue reacted.

Badly.

"Are you making fun of me?" She mumbled. And that did nothing but confuse him more.

"What? What are you talking about?"

"I have to go" She got up quickly, barely giving him time to process what she was doing as she walked pass him, towards the other side of the deck "I expend too much time here, I'm sure someone is looking for me right now, I'll simply float as high as possible to Buffalo can see me. Thanks for everything" A hand reached for her wrist, preventing her from taking another step, turning her around seconds later, finding that although she had definitely grown in those years, Law was still much taller than her; she couldn't even reach his shoulders. She pulled her hand, still looking down, not wanting to see his eyes "Let me go"

"Not until you tell me what you meant with that! You know I would never tease you like that" Law reached for her eyes, but didn't find them. He tensed his jaw in frustration, trying to understand what was going on in her head- Before, it was easy for him to know what she was thinking; did she really changed so much since that time?

"Not now, Law!" All Yue asked for at that time, was that her voice didn't sound like the begging she thought she heard. She closed her eyes tightly still with her head down, trying to keep at bay the tears that she felt were accumulating in her eyes. That was the exact same reason why she didn't want to be in the sub with him.

"Then when? You're going back to him! Do you really think it will be easy to see you again!?" He reached for her other wrist, but slid his fingers to hold her hand instead, holding it tightly, conscious enough to not hurt her.

"I said let me go! I have to go!"

"No!"

He could have stepped on a field full of mines as well, he would have gotten the same reaction, and it could have been safer.

"Damn it, Trafalgar! What!? Perhaps you think I don't have feelings!? It that? Did you never happen to think that I was waiting for you to come and look for me!? It was three years, Law! Three! Even when I knew you betrayed Doflamingo, I kept waiting for you! Even when you never told me where the hell you were going, I never blamed you! But you never came! You have absolutely no idea of how many times I tried to hate you- I'm still trying to hate you!"

She grabbed his sweater's neck in a threatening motion with the hand she managed to free in his surprise, and when Law tried to take a step back by inertia, still amazed by the explosion he thought he'd never see in his life, the sum of the two weights making him trip over his own feet, ending in a laying position on the floor with Yue practically sitting on top of his abdomen, but the blow didn't seem to tame her anger. He made a gesture with his hand to his crew when he say by the corner of his eye as they began to approach them, telling them not to move as he turned to look at the woman in front of him.

"Who do you think you are to simply offer me to be part of your crew!? Eh!? Why would I accept, if you never intended to do so in the first place!? You never tried to reach me! I had to get out! I'm not someone you can control as you please! I'm not a pet that will faithfully wait where you left me! I have been treated like that all my life, you know it!" She took a deep breath, feeling the anger grow in her chest as she noticed that the face of the main as impassible "You always said Doflamingo treated me like a doll; yes, it's true, and I hated it with all my soul! You know that! But you are not better yourself, you jerk!"

Yue breathed heavily, trying to catch her breath while trying to organize her thoughts. She felt like her mind was completely blank, and it was probably because she had emptied all her thoughts in that short speech. Exactly what had come out of her mouth? She was aware of a few things, but she didn't have the slightest ideas of others. She knew he had insulted him, then why he was looking at her like that? It was the same look he had given her years ago when he asked her why she never left the room. She clenched her fists, squeezing the yellow and black fabric between her fingers.

"Why are you not saying anything?" She mumbled "Why you are not trying to defend yourself?" She pressed her lips together and closed her eyes tightly, not wanting to see that look again, also trying to stop the tears that she was sure were going to get out in any time "Why are you only listening to me!?"

"Because those are almost nineteen years worth of complains that you finally let out" She opened her eyes in surprise, looking at him. His face was completely neutral, probably not having any doubt about what he was saying "You have never said that aloud, right? Even when you were younger you never complained, never said anything, you never cried. You always smiled and accepted it, because you thought that you had no other choice. You probably wanted someone to listen. Now that you are complaining I will not stop you, so go on, continue, I will hear everything you have to say without complaint"

Law didn't flinch when the first feel from her eyes and into his cheek, or when other three followed. He felt the pressure of her hands in his clothes slowly disappear, but he never stopped to look at the face above him, which slowly became more and more expressive when the mask started to fall- the mask that he showed her how to create. Yue completely released his sweater, bringing her body backwards until she was sitting where she had fallen at first, between Law's legs.

"This is not the time to act like a mature person, stupid" She mumbled, bringing a hand to her face to try and dry her tears, practically rubbing her eyes and cheeks. When she noticed that didn't work she raised the other one, repeating the same process, but as the tears multiplied in number, it became obvious that it wouldn't work at all. When Law got up on his elbows the crew sighed with relief now that the 'threat' was gone, leaving the impression that it had never been there in the first place. They slowly backed to the door, even pulling Bepo with them while closing the door behind them.

" You look like a brat when you cry " He sat as he could, reaching for one of her hands with one of his, so he could take it away from her face "You'll hurt yourself if you keep doing that"

"Idiot" She took a couple of deep breaths, rubbing her eye with the hand that was still free, looking at him through the tears that were still present. Didn't even bother to force as smile "You are running the moment"

Law laughed.

"What moment?"

"Jerk"


	15. If you could choose

Happy new year! Hope you still like the fic!

Disclaimer: I do not own One piece.

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_"What would you do if you could choose?" She looked up from the book she held in her hands, looking at the boy who sat beside her, holding a book on his own. The moonlight that passed through the window against the one they were sitting against helped her to try and guess what were the strange figures that could be seen in the pages. When she gazed up, she found that he was still looking at her, probably expecting an answer from her part. _

_"__Choose what?" She tilted her face to one side, curiosity growing in her eyes._

"Choose how you want to live your life"

She looked at her mini Den Den Mushi, being helped by the small lamp that was lit by her side, holding the little pink snail in her open palm. Her face was a mixture of so many different feelings that by taking a look at her face you couldn't be certain about what she was thinking; it even looked like her eyes were glued to the little snail- it was the third time someone called since she was awake, and it probably had ringed countless other times while she was sleeping, and considering that she had been sleeping for a _really _long time, that was something she couldn't just worry about, it was something she _needed _to worry about. She couldn't know who was calling, and in fact there were not a lot of options since only few people knew her number, but that was the disturbing part- the names that were inside that little list were names of people who probably, at that moment, were not happy in the slightest.

Among them, there was Doflamingo, and that only made her feel even more miserable, not wanting to know nor imagine what the man was doing at that precise moment. She could only pray and hope that Doffy expended more time than estimated at his work as a Shichibukai, enough so he wouldn't notice her absence until the last moment. That assuming that Buffalo had not said anything, because he _did _knew she was nowhere to be found- the first call she received on the first day she was in the submarine when they were on their way to Marineford was probably him wondering why the hell she wasn't where she was supposed to wait for him.

Of course, she didn't pick up that call.

Not that one or the ones that followed it, just as she was doing at that moment.

Even after the Den Den Mushi stopped ringing, she kept looking at it for a really long time, half expecting to hear again the sound that it made when it received a call, so she really didn't know whether to laugh or cry when she heard nothing after a couple of minutes. She had some sort of twisted luck. That was the only explanation she could think about at the moment. Yue left the Den Den Mushi on top of the small metal table that was next to the bed, sighing slightly as she pressed a hand against her face, trying not to feel like what she was doing was the most stupid thing she had ever done. She knew she had to do something, and quickly, but the plan that she began to draw in her mind one way or another ended up completely destroyed before she could even come up with an idea of what she was supposed to do now.

And the thing that destroyed when he didn't even know that they existed, was always the same one.

She looked at the man that sleeping besides her, arms crossed over his chest and completely messed hair. Yue reached for the sheets with one hand to cover him some more, even though the sweater he insisted to sleep with probably kept him warm enough. At first she had felt bad for having claimed his bed without even realizing that she was doing so, but Law didn't really seem to mind that- after all, he was the one that had placed her there after she had fallen asleep in a hallway, waiting for him to come out of the operating room where he was saving Monkey D Luffy's life, the man they had gone to save in Marineford. She had not gone outside the submarine to actually witness it, but she was the one who had refused to go outside in the first place, knowing that 1) _Doffy _was on that battlefield and 2) _Doffy_ was there and that 3) _Doffy _could see her.

Yue had the slight feeling that to sleep in the same room, in the same, looked pretty strange- the looks that his crew gave her when she went out of the sub in the mornings to receive the food that the Kujas brought for them told her that much, but her conscience was clean. She hadn't done anything- _they _had _not_ done_ anything, _even if the 'evidence' indicated the contrary. It was not the first time she had slept in the same place as Law, so why should she be embarrassed now? It would be strange to even think about the possibility of something different, and the nerves that she felt just when she started to think about that was enough proof.

In her opinion, the way they acted, what they did, how they sat and even how they spoke was as if nothing ever happened, it felt like nothing had ever happened, as if they had never been separated in the first place, as if things had always been just like that.

"_I can fix it_" Those words were still in her mind, probably because the impact that caused her to hear them just a few hours ago was really big. The determination she found in Law's eyes while he hold her hands, trying to keep at bay the shaking that had appeared on them not long after they reached Amazon Lily, was strong, leaving absolute no room for her to deny the fact that something was wrong with her- that was one of the little things that had actually changed, and Law didn't seem to want to ignore it, no matter how much she refused to answer "_If you tell what it is, I will look for a way to fix it_"

That man was ridiculously confident of his abilities.

And maybe it was because of that same confidence that he didn't even ask Yue if she had accepted the invitation to join her crew or not, and even when it was a really important point, she couldn't touch it or approach it. She knew it was wrong, but she was literally unable to do anything about it for the moment.

"Yue?" She turned her head when she heard her name, meeting Law's half open eyes, watching her without moving from the position he had awakened. She chuckle when she noticed how his eyes were unfocused, probably more asleep than awake, maybe he was not even aware of what he was doing.

"It's nothing" She smiled a little, shaking her head slightly, glancing sideways at the only window in the room, directly looking at the darkness of the night, strangely unable of seeing the stars "The sun is not up yet, so just go back to sleep" The man looked at her for a moment before closing his eyes again, moving his body in search for a more comfortable position. She chuckled again, thinking that he looked like a little kid.

Yue stretched her hand to one side, turning off the light, leaving the room in complete darkness. She laid in the bed, passing the sheets over her body and over the old set of clothes that Law lent her to sleep, keeping her eyes slightly open, being able of almost see the shape of the other person's face in the dark after some time when her thoughts wouldn't let her sleep. After a couple of minutes, when her eyes got used to the darkness, she could see his face a little more detailed than before.

"_I can fix it_"

"_No Law_" Maybe it was because she didn't want to see in his face the same look of frustration that Doffy had had so many times in the last months that she refused to say a word about why her hands were shaking or why she needed to sleep so much. It was a look that became more and more frequent when the shaking almost became a daily thing, or when the hours she needed to sleep multiplied by two. She didn't want to see that look on her childhood friend's face, not if she could evade it "_You can't fix this_" The word 'fix' always had a special meaning to them, but only because a little over ten years in the past her childish mind had understood the situation that but, but now that she repeated it on her mind, it sounded kind of illogical- Law had 'fixed' her ignorance and he definitely had fixed her loneliness, and he had done so because he thought that those fails could cause her 'damage' in a level she couldn't understand, not even now "You can't fix this" She repeated softly, smiling at the darkness in front of her "_Not this time_"

* * *

It had been quite a while since she couldn't see the island of women anymore, and now the things that her eyes could catch after much focus were the unusually large bubbles of Shabondy. Even from where they were, she could see the archipelago's natural color- bright green. Her eyes were fixed on the sky, mentally wondering what she would do if she saw the absolutely notorious color of Buffalo's outfit. No answer came to her mind when she thought about that.

She kept her arms against the metal railing at the deck, listening to the yells of joy and loyalty that the crew let out after listening to their captain's words- she didn't know how a man like that could attract people like was a matter of charisma, although most of the time it seemed like he didn't had charisma at all. She was sure that other people found his personality extremely arrogant, and it was probably of his extremely unnecessary comments. She had heard people saying that it seemed that he just couldn't keep his mouth shut.

The truth was that she admired that crew.

To blindly follow a man whose mind you couldn't never really understand was not something everyone could do, and something that she felt slightly identified with- since she started to work on missions, and even before of that, when she only walked through the castle and the villa, each time she stopped to think about the things that Doffy ordered she found that apparently there was not a single reasonable explanation for that man's decisions. It was why she understood how difficult it could be to follow Law as Doflamingo's subordinates followed the Shichibukai.

Se bit the inside of her cheek.

The reality was very cruel, and was her reality was that she didn't know what to do. She knew what she had to do, she knew what to do. By picking up the Den Den Mushi the next time it ringed she could go back to what she had known as 'home' all her life, back to the missions in the New World and the unnecessary doll-like dressed with bows of incomprehensible sizes. She would go back to the castle and the days of simply walking the halls that even after three years she didn't know… back to Doflamingo, the person who had taken care of her since she could remember.

It was what she was meant to do- what she had to do.

But that didn't mean she wanted to.

That didn't meant she wanted to leave all that behind, what she had only recently found.

Perhaps the person who was watching her from above didn't hate her as much as she thought- maybe those weeks had been his gift to her so she could live with no regrets from that time on, so all the "what if" what accumulated in her mind for years wouldn't stay in her mind as she fulfilled what had become her duty.

Going back.

And being next to that person when he asked her to do so, as a... as a doll.

"Are you going to go back to him?" She didn't turn around, and was probably the only one who didn't even thought the words were addressed to her. Even with her eyes closed, she knew that every man turned around to look at his captain without saying a word, but Yue didn't have the slightest intention of turning around. She breathed as slowly as possible, separating her elbows from the railing for a moment before holding the metal bar with her hands, feeling her palms sweating because of her nerves "Or you will stay with me?"

She had already said it once.

Every time she tried to make a plan, he destroyed it with a simple movement, or a single word, probably without even knowing it. Or maybe he did know.

What destroyed her conviction and left her floating in an abyss of doubt where she couldn't see nor top or bottom, was a slightly more complex question than what she was expecting. While, at the same time, it was something very simple.

She could hear the Den Den Mushi ringing again, but she couldn't bring herself to move a finger

_"What would you do if you could choose?"_

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**Guest (Or the person who asked if he/she could translate the fic): I would like to discuss it, so if you have a way of speaking with me I would like to talk about it.**


	16. Missing

Disclaimer: I do not own one piece.

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Doflamingo frowned, looking at the mini Den Den Mushi he held his hand. It was the third time he called her after he passed his duty as a Shichibukai to a fourth place in his list of priorities, but each and every one of those tries he had been left waiting for a long time before the snail closed his eyes again, not being able to contact Yue. It was not normal, and it certainly didn't left a good taste in his mouth, but he just shrugged it off, looking out the window of the ship that he was taking to Dessrosa.

The women around him were complaining loudly, with 'discrete' laughs and seductive smiles, trying to get his attention again, but the man didn't look twice at them, not even sideways. He brought the glass of wine to his lips, taking a long sip that after so many years doing the same thing, it had no effect on him- even if he wanted to forget the feeling that had settled in the depths of his stomach, it wouldn't be possible through alcohol.

"Where is Yue?" Was the first question he asked or rather one of the first things he said after he set foot inside of what he could call home. He didn't brother to look at the faces of the group of people that was walking behind him, following as he walked with his hands inside his pockets "She hasn't picked her Den Den Mushi, and that's not something that my good girl would normally do. Fufufufufu, is she in the garden?" Maybe not receiving response was what indicated him that something was not right.

He stopped and turned around, finding that those who were watching him had nervous expressions in their faces, expressions that at times were contorted in concern. It was not something that you would normally see at that place, and probably that was what told him that something was definitely not right. He frowned slightly.

"Well?" He demanded, his voice keeping the same tone as always, even when he noticed that he still got no answer "Where is she? I'll go look for her myself"

Baby 5 was the first one to step forward, not looking at him in the eye at first. The past events started to fall in place in the man's mind, revealing a possibility that for some reason became clearer and clearer with each passing second. When she looked up at last, everything made perfect sense.

"Young master..."

Suddenly, Doflamingo didn't want to hear what they had to say .

But although he had turned around even before the words left her mouth, what she had to said reached his ears as he walked down the hall and turned in a corner, going up the stairs as fast as possible and with an aura that frightened all the servants who crossed paths with him, pressing themselves to the walls or the railings to avoid being his the man's way, because he looked like another one at that time.

The room was completely empty, but that had become a daily thing in the past three years. It was strange to see Yue stay inside the room, and he couldn't remember the last time he had seen her sitting on the sofa she always used then she was little- in fact, Doflamingo couldn't remember seeing her doing any of the things that she used to do when she didn't have access to the outside. The person she had become after stepping out of that door was often unrecognizable, but the her way of smiling had changed, in the maid's words, to 'better'.

Now Doflamingo thought leaving her out in the first place was a mistake

The words echoed in his ears again, although the person who had said it was far away from him, and that only made him angrier than before, if that could be possible. He crossed the room, almost knocking off the furniture as he passed by them. After going around the table he pushed the windows open with one hand, allowing the breeze to enter the room while the man clutched the wooden frame, and his hold was strong enough to turn his knuckles almost completely white.

"_Miss Yue is missing_"

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So did you like it? Hope so! Leave review and I'll continue!


	17. Extra: Yueres

A/N: You can take this as a bonus, or a gaiden, even as an OVA , the point is that this is something I wrote because the story had more than 4,000 views! I'm extremely happy! Thank you all for your support.

**A/N: Doflamingo 's mind is completely and utterly twisted , so this is the result after trying to think like him, or rather after trying to think about the consequences of his actions. I don't really know if I could get so, so please tell me your opinions. **

**Recommendation: This is an extra, so try to listen to a song while reading. There were several I tried out, such as Rokutosei no Yoru, the ending of No. 6, I also tried it with some specific parts of Naruto Shippuden opening 16 , but could not find the, to put in one way, "perfect" song. Maybe you can find it. If you did, which one was it?**

Disclaimer: I do not own One Piece.

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"Gha!"

The sound caught Doflamingo's attention, enough to make him stop his steps and look into the room in front of which his was passing, noticing that the door was slightly open. He was coming inside the surprisingly small house after his man reported him that they work had been completed with the biggest discretion possible- no one in the small island had noticed his two ships anchored in one of the sides, although he had to admit that the darkness of the night helped as a natural disguise. They were not going to be there for the sun rise anyway, they just had come to take care of a… small thing.

Being as honest as he could get, he had to say that it was a shame.

At first he had been willing even to grant her his forgiveness and after a while give her back her position in his crew- give her back the place beside him that belonged to her only since the first moment she entered the crew. Going to the extremes he had to go had never been in his plans.

But well, things happened.

The only light that could be found inside the room came from a moon shaped lamp that was in one of the sides of the room, but that was enough for him to see the small figure that was moving on the ground, a couple of feet away from him, slowly approaching the pool of blood that adorned the floor of the room- that was probably the place where his man caught the traitor and her husband. Doflamingo raised an eyebrow, pushing the door open before walking towards the figure, noticing with the help of the light and the closeness that the 'thing' was, in fact, a little girl.

Her hair was so short that for a moment he thought she was a boy, but the little pink ribbon that a adorned her head took away any kind of doubt about the topic, besides the pink outfit that she wore, which he noticed thanks to his stature. She stopped her movements when her hands got to touch the blood, not moving a single part of her small body for a long minute.

So _that _was the reason why one of his best agents decided to start a home as far as possible from him with a man that apparently she had met in one of her missions, going to the point of providing information to the Marines in exchange of protection. Now, how his subordinates had not noticed the girl before? It was almost certain that her mother had hidden her, probably anticipating his plans. After all, that woman has spent years with him, it was ridiculous to think that she didn't know that he was coming for her.

"Fufufufufufu, what? Are you sad? Are you scared?" Her head, which couldn't be bigger than one of his palms, was low as she stared at the blood she had under her hands. Doflamingo raised an eye brow again- he had never been around someone so small, someone that probably had no more than two years of age, so he wondered for a moment if she might not know that he was talking to her. He crouched in front of the little body, who was pressing her hands on top of the pool of blood repeatedly, probably being the first time she saw something like that "Do you even understand me?"

The closeness of his voice seemed to be what made her realize that someone was talking to her, making her light her head to look at him, taking note or at least acknowledging his presence. Doflamingo's eye brow remained raised when, even with the still present darkness in the room, he could see almost perfectly her bright eyes. Maybe it was because those eyes had the same color as the blood that covered her hands and most of the lower part of her body, and maybe because it was a really big contrast against her silver almost white hair

Or maybe it was because those eyes were the same as _hers_.

"That's quite a interesting eye color you have there"

She tilted her face to one side, frowning slightly, almost like she didn't understand his presence, or like she didn't like his words and rook them in as some kind of insult. She stopped pressing her hands against the floor and sat on her knees, apparently unaware that the red thing that dyed the skirt of her dress and her hands, was blood, watching Dloflamingo as if waiting for him to say something else to decide whether to start crying or not, even thought she didn't even look close to tears.

"Oh? So you do understand me?" His eyebrow remained raised until he noticed that she didn't move from her place, still staring at his face, then it was when his face turned somewhat serious, getting bored rather quickly "I have to give you credit, brat, not many people stand looking at me in the eye for so long, and I guess that means that the only thing you inherited from your father was the hair color, since I bet he was a coward" He smiled sideways, and the opened her mouth slightly, like it was the first time she saw something like that, tilting her face to the other side; perhaps she has recognized the word 'father'.

Doflamingo quickly took a look of the rest of the room sideways, guessing by the pink color of the walls that it was the girl's room, besides from the small bad that was pushed against one of the corners. There was some kind of relief in the left wall that caught his attention, and when he completely turned his head in that direction he realized that some letter were hung on the wall. It was a name.

"Yueres?" He read aloud "Is that your name?" It was not like he really expected an answer, but at least he hoped she was looking at him the eye like before, but when he turned again he found that the girl was actually looking at his coat like it was the most important thing in the world, forgetting him instantly, giving the feather coat her complete attention "Oi, are you listening?"

"Doffy" The man looked over his shoulder at the person that was standing under at the door, hands on his back and a bit of an unknown object stuck against his left cheek "We found the documents in her office, and as expected they were the reports of each of our moves from the last two years, I made sure to find all of them and now they are ready to be destroyed it that's what you want"

"Nha, I'll take a look at them after this" He turned his eyes to the front, confirming that she still wasn't looking at him, probably trying to figure out what his coat was made of. The red eyes were still interesting to him, but he assumed that mostly what attracted his attention was the fact that she still didn't notice that she was sitting on top of a pool of blood- the blood of her parents. Not even the smell bothered her? "Oi, Vergo" He called after a moment of analyzing all the options that began to appear in his mind, each of them more promising than the previous one "Do we still have _that _fruit"

"Yes"

"She was really strong" He commented, as if thinking aloud, and Vergo questioned himself for a moment whether to answer him or not, was he even talking to him in the first place?

"She was"

"And probably we won't find soon another person with the same level of ability that she had"

"That's most likely"

Doflamingo reconsidered the options for a moment.

"Hey, brat" But she was not listening, stretching her small hands to try reach his pink feathered coat. Doflamingo pulled her up by the back of her dress until she was at his eye level, and if she was scared of the distance between her body and the ground, she didn't brother to show it "Yueres… Yue?" After a few moments she seemed to understand that he was speaking to her, because she looked up with big red eyes and stared at her reflection in the purple lenses, finding it rather amusing "Are you afraid of me?"

The girl laughed in his face, clapping as if he had said something extremely funny .

Silence was the only thing that filled the room for a moment.

The crooked smile crossed his face as he sat her on his forearm, not stopping to think that the blood stain would remain in the white sleeve of his shirt probably couldn't be wash out in the future . He stood up, tucking the other hand in his pocket as he walked to the door and past Vergo, who was still standing in his place, looking at him with a slightly raised eyebrow, probably the closest thing to a gesture of surprise that man was able to create. The girl seemed too busy playing with the feather to really pay attention to the maniacal expression that Doflamingo had on his face, or Vergo's fixed eyes on girl. The other man shook his head when his captain walked past him, and Doflamingo laughed while dropping a last comment.

"Good answer"

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**Before I forget about it, last night I I wrote a One Shot that is kind of linked to this fic, is called Daughter of Death, and I... well, I think you will like it**


	18. Hunting

So, I just hope this turn of evenst wasnt to obvious. XD and just hope you like it. And just to be honest, I dont really like it, I apologize and just to say that the next chapters, like the one after the next are part of my favorite

Disclaimer: I do not own One piece.

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The ship began to slowly move towards north, away from the port where it had been anchored just minutes before. The rest of the anchored ships were moving gently from side to side on top of the small waves, only one or two lights could be seen inside each of them. She poked her head slightly, pressing her hands against the wall of a corner behind which she was hiding, feeling that even with the darkness and the distance between the ship and her she was able to see the flag that was moving thanks to the wind- or rather, the crooked smile that was drawn on it, with a diagonal line that completed the design of the Jolly Roger.

A Jolly Roger that she could draw even with her eyes closed.

She didn't sigh nor did she make any sound as she backed away slightly, leaning her right shoulder against the wall after a second and closing her eyes for a moment. Her 'job' had created in her the habit of analyzing her surroundings for any king of detail that could tell her if she was in presence of some kind of group or organization, especially when she walked in places like that. She could only thanks all the gods she knew for letting her see that flag in particular before she was close enough to that its crew could see her, and that they had been busy preparing for their departure gave her enough time to find a place where she could observe them.

She had received the payment for her latest work no more than a couple of hours ago, and her plan initially had been to hop into a boat that traveled towards the next island so she could get as far as possible from her last contractor- in the past week she had visited a total of seven villages looking for _one _person and _one _stupid _briefcase _with documents that in her opinion were completely irrelevant, and she had the feeling that if she stayed on that island for another day or so, that man was going to look for her for another job. But now there apparently was no choice but to stay there until she was sure that she wouldn't find unwanted people on her way.

"_I'm good at finding things and finding people_" She sighed slowly, turning around as she shoved her hands inside of the pockets of the dark blue hoddie that even covered the beginning of the light pants she was wearing, walking through the crowd of people that only seemed to grow in number even when it was getting late- she concentrated on the sound of her boots splashing the small puddles that were left by the heavy rain that had fallen not long ago. She had to pull the hood over her head at some point, pushing the fabric that was covering most of her face with one firm tug, leaving it on her shoulders in the process. She moved from side to side, evading contact as much as she could, used to try to go unnoticed "_How hard it can be to hide myself?_"

In theory, she was already doing so.

If something she knew by heart, was that the most important sources of information were always in a bar, so by choosing one in the most remote part of the city was more than enough to know if any of _his _agents was hovering that are, but that didn't mean that places like the one she was entering at that precise moment were her favorites- since she started working she resigned herself from not having to deal with drunk people among other things. A light grin could be seen in her face as she walked towards a desolate corner of the bar, male laughter echoing in her ears with unnecessary loudness as she sat herself on the wooden chair, resting her arms on the table in front of her while keeping her eyes fixed in one place, analyzing the sounds that surrounded her and ready to focus in one conversation if a kwon name happened to be pronounced.

That had become a habit as well.

She lived looking for people and things that the most unexpected persons wanted or needed to find- persons that belonged to the underworld, head of organizations, dealers, even ordinary civilians, there was not limit in her contractors, as long as they request kept her on the move; that was her rule, one of the few conditions that she put before accepting a job. If something had been hidden by someone, she could and would find it. No matter what or who it was, she could and would find it, and probably the only reason why she was good at what she did was that she knew how to think like the people that she was paid to find.

Because she knew what was like to not want someone to find you.

Because she was living it.

Because she didn't want _him _to find her.

A hand coming out of nowhere puller her out of her thoughts, making her jump slightly in surprise. She blinked several times in a row, looking at the glass that had been left in front of her on top of the table before looking up at the waitress that was standing by her left, tilting her face to one side a little as she looked sideways at the drink.

"I have not ordered anything yet"

"You have an admirer" The woman smiled while nodding a little towards the bar before turning around and attending the other tables. The red eyed woman looked sideways at the place that had been pointed out, but she found no one particularly interesting or someone she already knew, so she turned her eyes to the drink once more, the strong smell of alcohol reaching her nose even when there were lots of other scents like that one around her, showing that it was _really _strong. She frowned when she noticed the red highlights that could be seen on the surface when she lifted the glass in her hand. It was her favorite drink. With her other hand she moved the tip of the little blue umbrella that was inside the glass from to another, leaving the drink in the table again.

Blue was her favorite color.

A sigh came from the deeps of her throat, her head hanging on one side and closing her eyes as she lifted the glass again and took it to her lips. She kind of straightened when her body recognized the familiar feeling of fire going down her throat, amazingly awaking all hr senses and quickly making her muscles forget what they had been through in her latest job.

"How did you find me?" She had absolutely no need of having her eyes open to know that someone had sat at the other side of the table after the words left her mouth, not even to know who was the person that was staring at her probably with a smile on his face- it was not even necessary to make sure it was the person she thought he was, because she was absolutely sure. So when she opened them as she lifted her head from her side and practically sank in her seat again, finding a position that seemed a thousand times more comfortable, looking at the eyes of the pirate had no greater effect on her "I've been very careful to hide each of my tracks in the last few weeks, after all the man that I was looking for was not the sweetest person in this world"

"Who says that I ever lost sight of you?" Neither the smile nor his way of looking at her went away when he lifted the bottle he held in his hand to his lips, and despite she rolling her eyes at his actions a smile appeared on the young woman seconds later. The laughter that had previously been annoying seemed to lose importance in the background, to the point where if she concentrated enough there were no more than murmurs, almost like the sound of an annoying mosquito. She smiled openly as she rested her chin on her palm.

"What are you trying to tell me is that you have been following me since the last time I visited you? Because, if I remember correctly, that was four months ago"

"Now that's ridiculous"

"Of course it is" Sarcasm practically soaked her words as the smiled change to a sideways one, trying not to laugh at the 'offended' expression that he man in front of her held, choosing to take another sip of her drink to hide it better. They both knew the answer to that question, but it was more fun if they pretended that he didn't know what she had been doing since the last time they meet- it was more fun to pretend that Law was not offended by what had happened almost a year ago, because it was quite obvious that he had that day as clear as water in his memory.

At least she knew she had it.

"You have to be a pretty skilled person to find someone who is dedicated to tracking people" She tilted her face to one side, with the smile still in place "Or either you are someone really desperate , you tell me"

"I need your help with something" She raised an eyebrow, openly expressing curiosity and surprise when she stared at him, waiting for him to explain his words while she pushed off her mind the memories of _that _day. Having the lifestyle she had adopted it was not strange to hear such requests, including the place where they were at that moment- usually her clients felt that being in a public place when they met her for the first time was the best for their safety, not that she knew why because he definitely was not a danger for anybody, so bars where always the first choice, but what was curious about the situation was the person who was talking to her at that moment "Although I think that to qualify it as 'help' would give much weight to this request"

"So what would it be? A favor?" She tilted her face to one side, absently moving the drink in her hands in a circular pattern, doing nothing at all to hide the curiosity she felt towards his words. And amused smile formed on her lips for just a couple of seconds "Oh my, do you want to offer me a job? I have to say that I'm not in the best shape right now, just got back from one and I actually thought of taking a vacation" A grin crossed her lips as she set the glass down, taking the umbrella in between her fingers when she leaned back on her seat "Although I'm sure that at any moment the last person that hired me a couple of days ago will appear with another 'uncompleted detail' that I had not 'seen' in the contract. But I could make an exception if it is you, for the sake of our friendship you even get to pay just half of my normal price"

"It's an invitation" He clarify, obviously amused by her argument.

"For what?"

"Hunting"

Yue instantly knew it couldn't be good.

That couldn't be good in the slightest.

And it couldn't _not _end in a bloodbath.

But there was one small detail that allowed the women to not think about that just for a moment, something she had make clear from the beginning.

"Law" The words slowly started to come out of her mouth, and for a moment she wished to noise to be louder, but she knew that still he could hear her perfectly. She tried not to look into his eyes as she said it, a desperate act that Yue tried to hold as long as possible. She bit her lower lip slightly when she realizes that she couldn't delay it more, so she took a deep breath, hoping for the best, even when she knew it was in vain "If I say yes to this invitation, I hope you know that it doesn't mean I'm accepting the other one"

His brow furrowed even before the last words came out of her mouth, probably knowing deep inside that was the answer he was going to get.

"Why?" And he didn't even tried to hide the growing dissatisfaction and anger in his voice, and what was in the background was pure frustration, she could tell, probably for all the times he had received a negative from her part.  
Law was equally or even more stubborn than she remembered from when they were kids. It was impressive how by having freedom to do whatever he wanted to do have him the twisted feeling that he had the right to drag other in his decisions just because they had some kind of relationship with him, and only to make it clear, Yue was making reference to the fact that the man apparently could not understand how she could go against his opinion, because for him none of her reasons had some type of validity- she had even begun to think that the voice that sometimes appeared in the back of his mind, the one that constantly remained her of how stupid her attitude was towards the general situation, was the surgeon's voice.

And it didn't matter how you saw it, that was perturbing thing to think about.

"You know why"

"Your judgment is clouded by your sense of honor" He crossed his arms over his chest as he leaned back in his chair, taking the same position she had seem many times. His brow was furrowed, and she was attempted to roll her eyes at that, but she knew that his mood would worsen it she didn't keep eye contact "You should not show that kind of things to a persona that will not return it, you know that he would never give you a choice, he would never try to hear your opinion about the matter, and that's pretty much the equivalent of what you are doing for him.

Within a number of weeks that she didn't have really clear, it was going to be one exact year since the first time she heard that little speech, and Yue was about to say that she knew it by heart.

She still could remember the sound that had made the mini Den Den Mushi after she thrown it over the railing of the submarine with all the strength she could muster, and she certainly still would remember the expression that Law had had when she turned around to face him, probably thinking that was the answer he was waiting for. So logically, it was obvious that she could remember her childhood friend's angry expression as well, the one that gradually had turned into confusion when, seconds later, she made it clear that it was not in her plans to stay with him. At that point not even Yue knew the plans she was referring, but it was nor long until she found something that was good enough for her- her new job. Besides, her choice had a small detail that, as strange and masochist that it seemed, it was perfect for her situation.

She had not chosen to Doflamingo.

But she had not chosen to Law either.

It would sound very selfish if she said that she had chosen herself, but it was what you could think if you heard it. The truth that she was never bothered to clarify, was that she had chosen to coming double betrayal, because staying with one would be like betraying the other; if she stayed with Law, she could feel like she was betraying the man that had certainly taken care of her all her life, the one that had given her shelter and food, things that in the past years she learned where hard to get, and something she needed to be grateful for. But if she stayed with Doflamingo, she would be betraying Law after having found him, the person who had taught her that out of her room where things that her mound could not even imagine, the person thanks to whom she was able to walk under the sun and the rain.

One option frightened her.

The other one made her feel sick.

So to not choose neither of them really seemed the best choice at the time, and although the voice deep in her mind said that she was a extremely stupid person to worry for things like that, the logical side of Yue was insisting on thinking as constantly as possible that she had been right in choosing what she had chosen.

And it was obvious as well that didn't mean Law was to agree with her decision.

It was hard not to notice that when she told him that in the face every single time they 'casually meet '; understand by 'casually' all the ties she had found herself being dragged to the submarine by a polar bear dressed in orange, forced to being there for hours before finding a way of escaping from the same submarine, and that was only because she knew how to threaten Law.

"I do not think I have enough alcohol in my system to keep going such a serious and stupid conversation like this one when we have already had at least fifty times in the last eleven months. And just to clarify, I do _not_ plan getting drunk tonight, so I guess we cannot talk about it anyway" She knew he didn't find fun at all that topic in particular, but it was not like he could change her way of thinking having reach that point "Why do you need my help form, anyway? Invitation or not, my skills were the first thing that popped into that head of yours, or at least it was the first thing you mentioned"

"I need information" After a moment, Law sighed heavily, recognizing her intentions. He would not forget it anyway, but showed that the subject he had in mind was quite important "I need names and exact locations. You know who to talk to get what I need, and that **if** such information is out of your network, which I doubt anyway"

"Flattery may take you to things with the rest of the female population, but if you think that's going to work with me, you are very wrong" They both smiled the same way after that, and Yue took the rest of her drink in one movement, still holding the umbrella in her hand. When the woman left the glass on the table she caught from the corner of her eye was a group at the other corner of the room where 'secretly' watching them, even though saying that they were watching her was ridiculous when it was obvious that that were watching Law's every movement. She knew his reputation had grown in the last months. She looked at the pirate nodachi for a moment before frowning a little, tilting her face to one side when she noticed the slight red strain on the handle of the sword… was that recent? "Law" Even thought he had given her his full attention after saying his name, Yue was still looking at the red spot, knowing _exactly _what it was- she felt like she could almost smell the blood from where she was. She lifted her face, looking at him with a feeling that was in the middle of curiosity and exhaustion, trying not to guess what he had been doing before he meet with her "Specifically, what are we going to hunt?"

He had been waiting for her to ask.

The smile he had on his face said that much.

The man got up quietly, taking his nodachi with one hand in the process. Once standing on his feet he held a hand towards her, with a calm smile on his face, waiting for a reaction from her part. Yue did not break eye contact, wondering if it really was a thing to accept that invitation when she had the feeling that she was not going to like the details at all. But something in the way he offered his hand told her that one way or another he would find a way to get her into the matter even if she was not willing to, so she chose to act as if the choice was really hers and took his hand, allowing Law to pull at it slightly so she would be standing besides the table. When Law laced his fingers with hers, Yue really wanted to take this action as a precautionary measure so she wouldn't run away when he answered her question- she _really_ made a big effort to ignore the two extra beats of her heart that pressed themselves against her chest, trying to focus Law's crooked smile, concentrating on how that couldn't really be good.

"Hearts"

And apparently she was right.


	19. Queen of hearts

**A/N: English is not my first language so please be patient with me. **

Disclaimer: I do not own One Piece.

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More than feeling that something was wrong, the first thing Law felt when he saw the unconscious man on the floor and the almost empty bar, just seconds after walking inside, was an immense curiosity. One look at his subordinates, who were sitting in a corner, and he knew they had not been the ones causing that scene.

Then he looked around for the next option, even when it was not the most likely one, passing over the faces of the braves one that had decided to stay inside the bar, all known faces from Wanted posters but not important enough to actually remember the names. He looked at the bathroom doors as well, waiting for her to come out at any time, but when she didn't he fell like all the pieces began to fall into their places inside his mind. He raised an eyebrow almost involuntarily when he understood what had happened before he got there.

For a moment he left the question aside when his crew gathered around him, probably already having begun to drinking long before he had returned, toasting the title their captain had returned with from Mariejoa, the place where they were not allowed to enter so they had to wait on Shabondy. Normally, a Shichibukai would not be something to celebrate, but since they had work so hard so their captain would gather one hundred hearts, it didn't matter. Plus, it was their captain they were talking about, he could never make bad choices, right?

Sometimes the loyalty of those men was really impressive.

After sitting in the corner that they had claimed for themselves and start drinking, obviously with a slower pace than his crew's, he scanned the bar for one last time with his eyes. It was normal for her to go out on her own sometimes, but she had never taken so long, so more sooner than later the question came up, and every one present knew who he meant even when he didn't say a name.

"Where is she?" Most of the voices went quite with his question, and the ones that were not too busy with their drinks grimaced, as if the subject was not their favorite at all, looking at the men that was slowly dragging the unconscious bodies across the floor and out of the middle of the room, giving Law the assurance that he needed to know that he had been right and she had done it. The mental picture of her, fighting with men twice her size, was not a uncommon one in those days, since Yue had been in their company for several months now, plus it was pretty entertaining to watch most of the time. He felt sorry he had missed it.

"She went to the back an hour ago or so ago" Bepo told him, totally relieved to have his captain back in one piece, since he had been the first who had shown signs of disagreeing with his decision, just for the mere thought it was not safe at all, but what was safe in the life of a pirate "She was pretty upset captain, so we didn't say anything"

"Pretty upset? She basically was in fire" Sanso, practically his right hand in the medical field, laughed after taking a long gulp from the bottle in his hand "She came first, captain, and when we got here those guys were saying something to her, did not last one minute after that 'cause Kogata was practically letting out smoke by the ears" He pointed with the bottle the men that the Bar owner was dragging towards the exit, laughing again "We are not suicide enough to go and ask her- _I'm _not suicide enough to ask, after all I was the one who taught her how to fight, so I know what the brat can do"

"Only you?"

"Ah, well, you are supporting details"

"Did anyone got to hear what they were saying?" After watching how Penguin and Shachi basically preparing to fight with Sanso, Law turned around to the rest of his crew, to each and every one of their faces as he asked. There were several voices responding negatively, and Law sighed a little, because whatever it was it was almost certain that it could not be good at all.

The sound of the back door of the bar opening was almost cero when Law set foot outside the local, finding himself in a not so narrow alley as he had expected, even thought it still was narrow. He looked at the sky for a moment- it was possible that it would start to rain soon so he had to be fast. He looked to his left and finding nothing then he looked at the other side, finding an apparently empty space before he noticed the tip of the black boots that were more than familiar to him from behind the boxes. When he approached her Law raised an eyebrow when she didn't even move, not even when his shadow joined hers. Though, if she was as upset as they had told him, there was no wonder.

"I should not leave you alone for so long" He pressed his right leg against one of the boxes, noticing the tight grip she had on a piece of wood that she had probably found lying somewhere in the ground. As expected, his voice took her out of her silence, making her turn her head towards him with a surprised look on his face. Law smirked "When you get bored you go looking for far too problematic things to occupy your mind with, you could ruin my reputation"

"You don't have any moral to say that ... And from _what_ do you think your reputation was _built_?" Yue snorted quietly, a small smile on her lips; he thought that maybe it had been long enough for her to cool her head a little. Law frowned slightly, watching the awkward movements of her shoulders as she swayed from side to side- It was something that it was just not good coming from the person sitting across from him. Her stare was not something he felt exactly comfortable as well, plus, her smile had faded almost as quickly as it had come, indicating that something was definitely not okay.

"Have you been drinking? That's the reason you ended up in a fight in a bar? I didn't know that was your style"

"I'm not the type of women that drown her sorrows in alcohol" She mumbled, looking across the narrow street , fixing her eyes on the lights that could be seen on top of the buildings- from where she was sitting the amusement park were nothing more than a blurry shapes that seemed alive, moving from one place to another without stopping. But Law was too busy looking at her with a raised eyebrow to notice the little details that she was trying to describe inside her mind; trying at the same time to push away the thoughts that would do nothing more than ruin the night. They were supposed to celebrate that night- she was supposed to receive him with a smile even when she thought what he was doing was one of the stupidest things he could have done, because no matter what she would always support him in whatever he wanted to do. It would be stupid not to after having helped him for months to collect all those hearts.

But then everything got ruined.

"Sorrows?" The word came from his lips in a tone somewhat mocking, but when it did not have any effect on her and he did not receive any annoyed look or a childish gesture that was meant to look like one of anger, the little humor that he found in the situation faded away almost immediately "You still have not told me what have caused your anger"

She didn't look up, nor did she give any indication that she was going to answer soon. Unconsciously one of her hands went to the paper that was hidden on his other side, her grip as strong as the one she had on the wood, feeling the material wrinkle in her fist and knowing that even if she destroyed that one there was already millions of copies around the world. But if he was asking it meant that he didn't know what happened, what led to Yue explaining to him anyway.

"Apparently this came in the newspaper this morning, I really don't know. Those... men rubbed it in my face, kind of teasing me" She held something in her hands so Law could grab it, still without moving her eyes from where she had them, and the now Shichibukai raised an eyebrow when he noticed thanks to the high lanterns that hanged over their heads that the piece of paper was nothing more than a Wanted poster. He silently took it in his hands, opening it enough to see the printed photo and the numbers of the amount of the reward for the person's head, being a coincidence that it was the exact same amount the government had given him in his first poster, the big '30' followed by some ceros. When he looked down, he was able to also read the name.

He didn't understand it.

But that was not something he was willing to say out loud until he analyzed it properly, his pride was too big to do so.

The name was unfamiliar to him, and if he had met someone called 'Aki' in the past it was not important enough for him to remember. The reason why the name brought so much confusion to his mind was the fact that it certainly was not the name of the person who had been photographed - although the picture was slightly moved he could recognize the clear blue fabric that Yue had bought in the first island they had gone to after she accepted to spend a few months in the submarine while they completed the 'hunting', wrapping her head and just leaving an opening for her eyes , which due to the angle from which they had been taken photography, couldn't really be seen.

"It doesn't show my hair, and it does not say my name" She continued , but her expression did not change, not even for a moment, keeping the impression that her mind was far from that place even though she certainly was still there "They invented one because they don't want people to know that they don't have enough information, but that does not mean they are not looking for the real one" He left the sword in the ground, sitting against the wall and next to her. Even from where he was Law could perfectly see how her hold on the wood was strong, to the point where her knuckles became completely white "This was just luck, but they will keep trying until they find who I am, Law. It's easy to just change a name, or change a picture if they get a better one- they _will _do it if they have a chance. They do not like not knowing what they are facing"

She knew he was watching her, but Yue was unable to return his gaze.

She was upset- She was upset with herself for letting something like that happen. Had she not been careful enough? Was that it? Had she opened too much in the fights they had been through? What did she do? What did she not do? She was completely aware of the things that could happen at the very moment she set foot inside Trafalgar Law's submarine, and she had been prepared to avoid the situation she had been running away from for almost a whole year. The word frustration didn't even resemble what she felt at that moment.

"This is exactly what I didn't want to happened" She muttered between her teeth, throwing the piece of wood against the wall that was a few feet in front of them , perhaps with a little more strength than necessary .

If she had a bounty for her head, then _he_ would know where she was.

If _he_ knew where she was, then _he_ would come and get her.

If _he_ came to get her, then_ he_ would try to kill Law.

It was a fairly simple formula.

**But it was not an option.**

"Your face is covered, he has no reason to think that you" Law followed the piece of wood with his eyes for a second "You're not the only person with a Wanted poster like this one, I lost count of how many masks I've seen them- takes as an example the second in command of Eustass –ya, Killer"

"I know" She nodded slowly. After a moment when neither of them spoke, Yue moved slightly from where she was until her arm touched Law's, and bowed her head until it could rest against his shoulder, closing her eyes as she sighed a little "I know it" She repeated in a quiet voice "But still ... "

It was in times like those when guilt literally tried to eat her alive.

It was the reason she avoided thinking about it most of the time.

Cold drops fell from the sky and over them lightly, making the two young people to look up at the same time. Dark clouds had covered the entire night sky, and it was likely that those drops were just telling them that they had to get out of there and fast. If they understood the message they did nothing about it at first, just looking at the clouds and at the now almost constant falling drops.

It was a rather depressing sight.

Something that, Yue recognized, didn't help the situation at all.

"We should go back inside" Remarked the young woman after a silence, separating her head from where she'd put it. The two of them stood at the same time, and a Yue stretched her arms a little towards the sky, feeling as the concern took and almost permanent place at the very top of the stomach, so she almost immediately groaned slightly while lowering her arms again. There was only one way of almost completely remove it, or at least forget about it, so she looked at Law with a smile when he raised his nodachi in his hand, but before she could say anything he had already started talking.

"I just want to make sure you know what this means" For a moment she remained silent. That was the only proof missing that Yue needed to prove that he _really _knew how to ruin a moment just with one of his comments, which she kept finding incredibly unnecessary

"Despite everything you are enjoying this, right?" She snorted without any kind of decency, yet her face had a cocked smile on, while she was looking up at the sky to avoid his eyes at all costs, just as her inner self was accepting the situation. That also entered in the category of frustrating things, and kind of hurt her pride in a considerable amount, perhaps because of the fact that she was the one who in the first place refused to even consider the option, and she had been also the one who had refused it over a million times. She should have known that since the first time she said 'no' that he could look for the way to put her between the wall and the sword quite literally, so in that time there was nothing more than to say her answer in a mumble "Yes, I do understand"

"And your answer?"

She really hated his guts.

A sly smile appeared on her face, perhaps because of the irony of the situation, or perhaps because Trafalgar Law had almost completely turned her into someone as crazy as he was.

"Since you left me alone with a group of men and a bear for over three days and three nights , it would be rather gentlemanly of you to pay my first round of drinks, Captain "

"Your wish is my command " A grimace immediately crossed Yue's face, knowing what was going to come after the reverenced that Law made with the upper part of his body and his arm across his chest- the fact that he was someone who hated with all his heart to follow someone else's orders almost made all of that ridiculous to hear and see. She looked sideways at the Wanted poster that was now lying on the floor, wondering if at some point of her life she would get used to the nickname that had been 'officially' given to her. Law raised his head with a crooked smile on his face, noticing her disagreement towards the matter as he reached over for her hand, intertwining his fingers with hers, something that for some reason he had taken as an habit in the last months, something that had given Yue countless hours fighting Sanso to make it clear that between Law and her there was nothing more than a friendship of years… a very strong friend ship "Queen of Hearts"

And probably that nickname wouldn't help at all when Sanso got to know it.

It was not like sharing a room with Law helped the situation either, but that was necessary. Law had _sworn_ that the other rooms were occupied with extremely delicate materials that were needed to keep safe, so she couldn't have her own room.

And that was why the now Shichibukai was still waiting for the yell of fury of his childhood friend when she realized that was one of the biggest lies he had told in his life- because, at some point she had to discover the three empty rooms that were in the submarine at that precise moment, right?


	20. To know (FINALLY)

A/N: English is not my first language and therefore is likely to find grammatical mistakes in this chapter. Please be patient with me.

Disclaimer: I do not own One Piece.

* * *

Yue's inner self knew it.

Her inner self knew that _he _knew.

He inner self knew that he knew that _Yue_ didn't know.

Therefore her inner self also knew that he knew that Yue's inner self knew that everyone knew, except the red eyed woman.

But that was not entirely true.

It was not like she didn't know it.

It was not as if she were blind, and she didn't notice how he watched her.

It was not as if she were deaf, and she didn't notice how the tone that he used when he spoke to her was different from the one he used for the rest of the world.

It was not as if she were stupid, and she thought that the physical contact that he demanded from her at all times was part of the very strong _friendship_, to the point where she was used to only have one free hand for all the times and all the hours he kept her by his side through her hand.

It was not like she did not know it, _really_.

Yue ignored it.

Or maybe he blocked it; that was a word that could also be used to describe it.

Do it even entered her list of the natural reactions that wee activated when he was around, which was most of the time, if not all day. It was basically forget any moment that could tell where what it was obvious for the rest of the world except her, because for Yue it was extremely easy to not see what she didn't want to see.

It was hours and hours of fighting with Sanso just to make clear the point that the crew simply didn't understand their friendship.

It was to pretend that hold the other's hand was a sign that they missed each other all those years.

It was to laugh animatedly at all the people who had confused them with a couple in the island they had visited.

It was to escape to the bathroom once or twice a day so no one could see the blush that was slowly accumulating in her cheeks. It worked as well to escape to the training room; hitting the punching bag was a great way to confuse her blush with physical activity.

It was to quietly complain when every night Law pushed down the wall of pillows that she put between the two of them when they were going to sleep and wake up with an unnecessary source of warmth besides her, which left her locked in place until he decided to wake up and stop using her as a teddy bear.

It was, in simple terms, to ignore everything that suggested something between them.

Because there was something that both Yue and her inner self knew perfectly, even when the woman ignored it when she could.

If she let him get too close, if she let the wall of friendship that they had raised for many years to collapse, if she accepted what everyone expected to happen at any time, Trafalgar Law was going make her completely crazy.

And she was extremely careful.

Because it was likely that this fact was something that Law knew as well. .

"That's ridiculous, you're ridiculous!"

"Denial is the first step to acceptance!"

"There is _nothing_ to accept! The Marines are stupid for even thinking about putting something so wrong and out of place like that- _you_ are stupid for even saying that! It's just a stupid nickna - "

"I think its okay"

_Complete silence. _

Yue looked at the bear they had as second in command with her mouth slightly open. In moments of boredom, precisely was that one, the crew looked for any topic to talk about, and on each of those occasions it was not long until Sanso broke the silence with a comment about her; the rest of the crew supposed it was because she was the only person who reacted immediately to his provocations, yet they didn't try to stop it, perhaps because they didn't stand on that particular woman's way when she was upset, or maybe it was because they were bored as well and wanted something to entertain themselves with. Generally no one got in the middle of their fights, not even Law even when more than once they had got bruises all over the legs and arms that lasted weeks to disappear, for this reason it was a surprise to hear Bepo make a comment, or more specifically, making a comment that was actually supporting Sanso.

"You too Bepo? I thought you were on my side!" Sanso smiled victoriously at her words, looking at her with a smile from side to side as the woman turned her attention to the bear, who to everyone's surprise didn't apologize right in the spot. That day's topic had been about her 'nickname' , and the discussion started because Sanso had said that if the Navy called her 'Queen of hearts' was because even for them the relationship between the captain and Yue was obvious.

"But its obvious Yue" Now everyone looked expectantly at the bear, who at the same time was looking at the woman like it was amazing that she couldn't understand something as simple as that. Yue was even tempted so ask him to explain what he meant, but seconds after that she regretted having thought about it as the bear spoke as if she had asked anyway "Because when the captain becomes the Pirate King, you'll still be his queen"

Those words and the laughter that followed, which echoed through the dining room and even echoed in the halls, accompanied by the Law's triumphant smile, who had entered the room just at that precise moment, immediately sent her straight to the training room, closing the door behind her with all the strength she could muster – it was better for them to think that she was annoyed enough to break the sandbag. And there she stayed for the next hour, using the small bathroom's sink to wet her face with cold water until her fingers crinkled, believing that in that way the blush and the heat that were accumulated on her cheeks would go away. Although it was not like I was really working...

She didn't even want to see her reflection in the mirror against the wall.

So she choose to remove her boots and wrap her hands with bandages to prevent any damage she could do to herself, standing in front of the sandbag while breathing deeply.

**THUD**

It was not Bepo's fault- she could never blame Bepo when she almost loved him for being, in her opinion, adorably adorable, so she decided while throwing the first set of punches that it was Sanso's fault. Blaming Sanso was fine, she had always done it, and it was something that had worked perfectly so far, besides, he had been the one that had started with the incredibly unnecessary comments even before her Wanted poster came out, and he had always started their fights since he made his personal life goal to mess with her, besides being his favorite hobby.

Yes, it was all Sanso's fault.

She tried to keep that in mind as she sat on her floor, still looking at the sandbag, panting. That stuff had helped her clear her mind, but she always ended up really tired. Yue close her eyes as she leaned her back against the ground, feeling the cold metal though her shirt, but it had no effect in her since she was used to it; the submarine was, after all, entirely built of metal. Being locked in a space like that for so long with nothing more than men and a bear to talk had made her hate testosterone.

Oh, well, that was not entirely true, it was unfair to said that when 'Lina', the okama that was probably twice her height and worked in the kitchen. But she was pretty sure that was not his real name.

"Does it bother you so much?" Yue opened her eyes in surprise, meeting Law's eyes, who was standing near her head as he watched her with the same expression that he always had whenever he found an article of Eustass Kidd in the newspaper- that could only mean he thought that was a pretty funny situation. Yue felt a vein lightly pressed against her forehead as she frowned, focusing more on the fact that he was making fun of her than the fact that she could feel her heart rate racing.

"Of course it bothers me- Someday I 'm gonna make him sit on his knees and apologize for each and every one of those… those… ugh, I can't even find a word to describe those comments!" She raised and lowered her legs, constantly pressing her heels against the metal one time after another, determined to keep inside the room some kind of constant sound. She wouldn't be able of getting out of that situation if she let the room going silent.

"I didn't mean that"

Although a trace of humor could be seen in his eyes for a second, Law had changed to a somewhat more serious expression, more than the normal one. Usually around her his personality was somewhat lighter in comparison to how he behaved at other times, but this was not the occasion. She tilted her face to one side, confusion obvious in her eyes.

"No?"

If she'd known what he was going to say after that , she would have ran out of the room at that precise moment.

"Does the idea of being my queen brothers you so much?"

"_Well, damn it_"

She chose not to take her thoughts and put them in words.

And suddenly she couldn't move her heels anymore. Perhaps the silence and tension lasted a second one, two at most, but it was enough for all kinds of options and possibilities go through the woman's mind, and she had been through enough to know that the same things were going through Law's mind. _Exactly_ what he was thinking at that moment? What he wanted to get with that question? He knew the she got really frustrated when she wasn't able to read him, and that was why he put a mask on at that moment, but contrary to feeling upset or frustrated, she took deep breath as she felt nervousness in her stomach.

She chose to swallow hard and try to pretend that she was not sweating cold.

" ... And you are you asking because ...? "

"I find it curious that you're answering a question with a question" Law raised an eyebrow, like that was really funny or surprising, even thought it wasn't and they both knew it. At what point and how he had become such a good actor was completely out of her knowledge, although she had a feeling that he had always been like that, only that she had not noticed before, she still remained as stone anyway while Law analyzed her face with his clear eyes, leaning almost completely and covering her with his shadow, smirking slightly "Though, I cannot really call that an answer, can I?"

"What do you think you're doing?" She muttered between her teeth, slightly narrowing her eyes. She didn't like at all what was happening at the time, mostly because Yue knew exactly what they were talking about- She had asked because at first she really didn't understand that her captain and friend meant with those words. She thought she had already made it clear he didn't need to talk in code, because it really was insufferable.

"What do you think _you _are doing?"

That conversation didn't really have any sense and/or base, but still ...

"How do you manage to always sound like I'm doing something really wrong?" She mumbled, getting the slight impression that she was at a disadvantage in terms of position.

"Don't get mad because of something like that" Her words obviously amused him to no extent, his smile and his eyes showed it. The thing Yue didn't count with was him sitting beside her on the floor when she had not moved from her position, looking at her the same way, but she did not move an inch- well, actually she he did, but away from him as much as she could when her back was still lying on the floor. She growled slightly as Law raised an eyebrow, obviously noticing her actions, the only thing Yue prayed for was for her pulse had quickened just with his closeness "I thought our type of relationship had that phase behind," He added to his previous words.

"Leave me alone" She muttered as she turned onto her face, facing away from him. Yue mentally cursed herself when she could still feel his eyes on her back, also mentally cursing herself for being so stupidly weak. Hadn't she been spending the last months avoiding that exact kind of situations? Hadn't she spent months planning ways to ignore the feeling that formed in her stomach? He just had to ruin it, right? All her attempts to keep her sanity intact even after joining his crew.

Yue closed her eyes tightly.

She was really tired of being in situations like that.

But she couldn't let him know.

She was really tired of ignoring it.

But she couldn't stop. Why? Even she no longer really knew it. Yue just knew she couldn't.

She opened her eyes slightly as she felt the nearness of something.

There was a hand almost next to her face, resting against the cold floor, and it was when she realized that Law was pinning her to the ground, the length of his arms allowed him to put his hand there while he still sat motionless at in his place. Despite her heart rate racing Yue frowned almost immediately, basically feeling caged, which she basically hated, and he knew it. She turned her face towards him without moving her body, ready to tell him to move away, but the sudden closeness that had his face with hers was too frightening to really process what was happening until his 'childhood friend' completely crossed the distance that separated their faces.

Saying Yue was frozen was not even close to it.

To say that her brain had stopped working was an understanding.

Saying that she basically panicked when her mind processed what was happening, could be understood.

When she tried to push him away with her left hand while trying to sit up, Law held her wrist before she could even touch him, basically restricting any movement due to the position in which she was, pressing their lips together even further. Yue didn't close her eyes, she was even prepared to curse herself if he dared to do it, but she actually didn't know what was worse: to close her eyes and accept it with the same ease that she was expected to accept it, or to keep them open and directly look into his eyes because Law planned not to close his eyes either.

She felt heat climb suddenly to her cheeks when she noticed the humor in them, but to her utter horror, when she thought of making another effort to push him her body flatly refused to do so. Apparently her inner self was enjoying it much more than that Yue was actually aware off, because the embarrassment she felt at the time really was not normal at all.

By the time they separated Yue could practically hear every imaginary brick wall she had built fall to the ground and break into a thousand pieces in the process. She didn't even felt when he released his grip on her wrist, caressing her cheek with his thumb, probably smirking at expression she had at that moment.

"Does it bother you?"

To repeat the question seemed stupidly unnecessary.

It was something that only he would ever do.

Smile like that at that precise moment was something only he could do.

And to the horror of women, it was too late when she found herself answering without really thinking about what she was saying.

Yes, it was too late.

He had already turned her into someone as crazy as he was.

"Do you think it's worth it? That title is already mine anyway"

The point was not that she knew.

The important thing was not that she knew that he knew.

The important thing was not that she knew that he knew that she knew that everyone knew.

What mattered was that Yue knew that he knew that she no longer denyied it- or at least that she couldn't do it anymore.


	21. Just a little more

**Recommendation: I read this incredible fic called "How it's perceived" and I wanted you to read it as well!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own One Piece. **

* * *

Law was a jerk.

He was an incredibly big jerk.

He was an incredibly big jerk who apparently was unable to think of the feelings of others in emergencies like that.

Because he _just had_ to go around giving incoherent orders while sitting inside of a _cage_ with kairoseki's chains and being taken outside the laboratory to suffer a_ slow_ death at the hands of a maniacal and frustrated scientist who had _nothing_ more _important _to do with his life than trying to give his stupid experiments some type of importance- that was another one that didn't care about other's feelings.

How he _dared_ to tell them to do _nothing_?

"_Men_" Yue growled mentally as she wrinkled the note that the reindeer besides her had been holding. She had recognized Law's handwriting almost immediately after the paper impacted with the face of what she could hardly believe was a not a raccoon but a reindeer, and to read it only made her angrier than how she already was since she learned that her captain had made an alliance with Mugiwara no Luffy in the span of time he had been outside the room where she had been left waiting with Monet, a topic that deserved its own space to be discussed- How the hell he got to do something like that in less than three hours? "_All of them are the same_"

The logical part of her brain told Yue it was a good idea to stay inside the room where she was hiding with reindeer that Law had obviously helped infiltrate within the laboratory, having noticed minutes ago who was the person who was on the other side of the metal wall was someone who would not be nice at all to see face to face; she just couldn't imagine what Vergo would do if he saw her there. The two years she spent hiding would be completely useless if he realized who she was- sure, she had the fabric to cover her face, but with someone as perspective as he was she just couldn't take the risk. It was safe to stay in the room with Monet because they had not seen each other in five years, and the difference between a sixteen-years-old and a twenty one-years-old was quite big, so she hadn't been worried. To stay hidden and do nothing as Law had said was the best option.

The other part of her brain kept saying that Law was a jerk of unimaginable proportions.

That was the part that she was tempted to follow.

"Are you okay?" Yue looked down, not really used to having to do so she could look someone in the eye, meeting the reindeer's eyes. The woman let out air slowly, resigning herself to her anger- she had more important things to worry about, because now they had to deal with the situation that, she insisted, Law had gotten them in. She shook her head slightly.

"Yeah, it's nothing" Her voice came out like a whisper, knowing she couldn't speak louder than the strictly necessary. She turned with insistence the ring that was in her right hand, trying to concentrate her thoughts on something besides Law and how she was planning on killing him for leaving her in a room with a woman he _knew _she couldn't stand- she didn't care if he was her captain, as the person he always dragged inside all his stupidities Yue had the right to kick his ass from time to time.

When the bag that Law had left on top of the couch started to move as if something alive was inside it a severe headache started to grow from the depths of her brain even before Chopper poked his head out; she liked to call it a sixth sense, because each tie it appeared that way it meant that Law was doing something that immediately involved her, something that probably was not going to end well at all. She knew the reindeer by his wanted poster, so knew as well that he was part of Mugiwara no Luffy's crew, and that did nothing but increase her headache. Law had something like fascination with that crew even before they were off to save its captain in Marineford, and if they were involved it really couldn't be good. When the reindeer explained their plan the only reason she actually believed it was because he called her by her name- When her poster first came out they decided that she was to be called Aki when they were close of the marines or in a fight, but Law had given them her real name, so it was clea that the situation was completely serious.

She let air out of her lungs slowly once more, trying to connect their arrival to Punk Hazard months ago with the most recent events. Law had no way of knowing that Mugiwara was going to appear on the island at that moment, so in theory the main plan remained the same, and she got from what she reindeer had told her that their goal was to defeat a Yonko. It was not really far from the original plan, but Law had certainly not told them that about the step involving Joker. What was he thinking, then? He had become a Shichibukai to get there, so she doubted he was willing to risk everything by taking in Mugiwara no Luffy only for the mere pleasure of trying to know the kid.

"However, we cannot stay here much longer, it is too dangerous to be in the same room with that man" She tried to poke her head into the next room as little as possible, meeting immediately the three figures that were carefully watching the screen that was being projected against the wall. A grin crossed her lips, not wanting to witness any of the experiment of the man that she had branded as a lunatic since the first day she had met him. Yue scanned the room as best as she could, trying to use her memory to fill in the blanks. She turned again, looking at the reindeer "If we get to that door we can go out into the hallway; I don't know the laboratory like Law, but enough to lead us to a relatively safe place"

"To get out of here…" He moved slightly to see out, just as she had done seconds earlier. After a second he looked at her again, looking a little more alarmed than before "Are you sure about that? These people are very scary. I can try, but you ... "

"Oh, please don't worry about me, sometimes to have this size is quite advantageous" She smiled sideways at how ironic it was to say that, because she had even lost track of each and every one of the times she had started fights with Sanso to make it clear that she was only a little bit shorter than the rest of the people her age, and that usually never ended well "You said your name was Chopper, right?" The reindeer nodded after a moment, looking just as worried as before. She couldn't really blame, Yue could feel the nerves build up inside her stomach as well, but she did her best to try to put it aside "Chopper, I need you to do me a favor. After we leave this room, under no circumstances you call me by my name. You can call me Aki, that is how they think I'm called"

"Huh? Why? "

"Not the best time for such explanations" She looked over her shoulder at the room again, trying to control her breathing as best she could. She tried to keep in mind all the times she had slipped inside buildings, trying to keep away the fact that none of the missions she had done in her time as an informant she had been in danger with she was now. She shook her head- that kind of things were not helping at all "I'll go first, if they happen to notice me you stay hidden and wait for a change. If you get to the hallway just turn right and then left, you will reach the level where all the stairs are connected. You can find your friends there"

"N-Notice?"

"Yeah well" Yue smirked, nervously pressing her hands against the floor as she breathed deeply. She rose slightly, turning her body around and looking at Chopper over her shoulder, still with the smirk in her face "I really want to avoid that, so let's just hope they don't do it"

* * *

She was going to_ kill_ him, even if Law got angry with her after it.

If Mugiwara no Luffy didn't get unconscious by the time she see him, she was going to make sure that Caesar wouldn't wake in the a few days, and if he happened to wake up again she was going to do it again.

Yue ran behind the group of marines that carried Mocha. From where she was Yue could see Chopper, and even with the cries of other children behind them she could hear a bit of what he was saying- even with the background screams she could still listen to the reindeer's cries. They had spent the last two hours running around the lab basically looking for the children they were running away from now, and Yue couldn't remember the last time she had climbed so many stairs. She clenched her teeth together when she entered the examination room, watching how they left Mocha on the stretcher as Chopper began the treatment.

She knew Caesar was sick in the head, but did not think that far.

Did he really didn't have an idea of the consequences of his actions?

No, he had, but he decided to go ahead with it anyway.

That man was completely _sick_.

It was not like her captain was the kindest person in the world, he was a pirate after all, but Law had never reached the point Caesar had reached. From the moment she met him Yue had wanted to turn back and call the submarine that had been going towards a new island, with orders to wait for them to call. The only reason she was even there was because, first, Law needed some kind of support in the case of the unlikely events to go out of hand, what was basically going at that moment, and second because she need the notes that Vegapunk had left behind inside the lab, but no matter how much she searched for the, there was not a single page. She was beginning to doubt they even existed.

They couldn't ask Caesar directly to get the information, plus they had to be a little more careful about it around Monet. And even if they could ask, she wouldn't do it anyway. She didn't want to get involved more than necessary with that man, and if she had to get the information out of him she would prefer to do it after they left Punk Hazard and away from the poisonous gas, after getting the kids safe, and after she had let some steam off.

When he didn't even know how it felt to be an experiment…

"We have to get all the candy out!" Chopper's command caught her attention, lifting her head to see how the marines were trying to turn over Mocha's body as delicately as possible to let her on top of her stomach. She looked from side to side, concentrating on the search.

She approached the metal bucket that she luckily could find in one corner of the room, leaving it at the front of the table while making sure that Mocha wouldn't have to move at all to reach it. Her hands trembled, nervous, when the contents of the child's stomach began to fall inside the metal bucket, slightly sighing with relief when the first candy thudded when it fell inside it- they were almost the same size as before, so it was not as late as it seemed at first. She could remember the way throat dried when the girl ate all the candies, even though Mocha knew it was a deadly poison.

Probably one of the worst things she had ever witnessed, and she had seen quite a lot.

"Com one Mocha, you can still spit it out, don't let it stay inside your body" Her intention was that her voice came out as a whisper, but it was likely that all present people was able to listen to her, not that they were paying close attention at the time. Although if she had lifted her eyes for a second she would have seen Chopper looking at her while she was focused in rubbing the girl's back "I know what I'm talking about! Is not worthy to live like this!" She mumbled.

When the problems touched personal points they seemed to weight a ton more.

Her medical knowledge just went a little beyond the basics, having spent the last year in the company of a crew in which it seemed that everyone knew a little of everything, but it was not really necessary when the medical staff of the marines was present. She stood besides Mocha's head while she was being treated, removing the fabric from her head and using it to wipe sweat from the forehead of the girl since there was nothing else at hand. At that moment it didn't really matter that the marines saw her face, it was not them who she was hiding from anyway, and she could always think of something if she found Vergo or Monet.

Sometimes she thought that at that point there was nothing to lose.

"The roof is collapsing!" Almost as if it were because of that single exclamation, seconds after it the walls started to shake as hard as the ceiling and the floor, causing the metal gurney on which Mocha was sleeping to start moving "Chopper- yan, nee- chan, this place is not safe anymore!"

"Good, I finished the first aids! We have to go to the R building!"

"If this goes like this something can fall on top of Mocha..." Yue looked at the ceiling, following the large cracks with her eyes. They stretched almost across the room, and the tremors that could be seen from above probably only worsened the situation. What was happening in the rest of the lab? She felt like it was going to explode at any minute.

"Yu- Aki?" She felt momentarily relieved about warning Chopper beforehand about her name, but it seemed that she didn't have to worry about it with the G-5. She raised her right hand and looked at the dark ring adorning her middle finger, the same ring that she was basically using against her will, but nevertheless had not been removed for months- she knew she couldn't take it off if it wasn't and emergency, and even with that it was possible that Law got mad to her after it.

But ... she hadn't used since they had come to the island, so there shouldn't be any major problem.

"_As long as Law doesn't know about it_" She mentally decided, nodding slightly to herself as she took the ring off her finger. She smiled at the almost instant effect, feeling the energy that she had had forgotten returning to her body in almost a second; if it wasn't because what consequences came with taking off the ring, she would to it often. Yue put the ring in her pocket while the sound of failing rocks stopped rumbling inside the room, but she could still hear the ones from the hallway. They would stop when they started to run.

"T-The roof stopped collapsing..." She looked up like the rest of people present, looking at the pieces of metal still in their place, only leaving visible a couple of cracks. The smile remained in place for a few more seconds, but the feeling that she had achieved a small victory couldn't get her to ignore the sound of falling rocks in the hallway, so her face turned somewhat serious as she turned to look at the men.

"What are you doing? Quick, we need get out of here! I can't hold it for much more than a couple of minutes!"

"H-Hai!"

"_Just until we get out of here_" She tried to run at the head of the group, constantly keeping her powers going as they passed, listening to the falling rocks after them when they were out of her reach "_Just a little more_"

It was only a little more, just a little more

* * *

And Punk Hazard.

You know what that means right? Doffy is near! Dessrosa!

**What do you think will happen? What do you want to happen?**


	22. Not willing

Disclaimer: I do not own One Piece.

* * *

"Joker described to me her condition, but it is the first time I can actually see it"  
Law looked up slightly, using the light of the moon that was in the sky to look at Caesar's face and the twisted smile that had formed his lips. The Shichibukai frowned slightly, and he didn't need to look at Yue's face to know that the scientist was referring to her. The woman at that moment was sleeping soundly with her head resting on one of Law's legs, said man was sitting against the Sunny's railing, and the way in which he had gotten himself in that position just barely after his subordinate started to show signs that she was going to fall asleep at any moment was something that had caught more than one person's attention, but the comments had not been about his actions but about Yue's.

After they had made it out of the lab, and after eating with the Marines , minutes after setting sail the woman had just begun to give the impression with no apparent reason that she could fall asleep standing in her feet if the opportunity presented itself, although the doctor of the crew was now his ally Chopper had begun to comment about a 'ring' Law was quick on shutting him with a look, because he certainly was not willing to comment on that topic- if he didn't knew about the circumstances in the laboratory he certainly would be angry at her for letting a complete stranger to witness something like that.

It was obvious that in the eyes of the straw hat Yue's attitude was something very strange, because they had seen how she had practically sat on the floor of the car they used to leave the laboratory a second after her eyes fell on Baby 5 and Buffalo- or rather, Nico Robin had seen it and then had discussed it with her crewmates, thing that Law didn't appreciate in the slightest.

"I have to say that she did an excellent job hiding it all day while she was in the lab" Continued the prisoner, still with the crooked smile on its place, looking happy to have found something interesting to entertain himself with. Law's expression apparently was something that kept him in good spirits "And even Monet couldn't recognize her, but now I certainly remember" A grimace crossed his face, as if remembering something unpleasant, but as quickly as it appeared it was gone, leaving in place the crooked smile once more "Something really interesting, and a waste not to have her under observation, if you ask me"

Law looked sideways at the members of the straw hat crew that were standing guard a few feet away from them, completely immersed in their own conversation, too nervous to listen to what they were saying. Law turned his eyes to the scientist, hardening his gaze as much as possible before talking again, trying to sound as neutral as possible, since now that the opportunity had presented itself he couldn't let it pass.

"So am I correct in assuming that you also remember Joker's petition regarding the cure?" A laugh escaped from Caesar lips.

"There is no cure if there is no illness, Law, you should know it"

"I know what it's not" The man narrowed his eyes, looking at him sideways and trying to keep the same tone of voice; she certainly would not wake up because of it, but that was not an information that the Straw hat needed to know- the alliance definitely _did not _cover those extremes, and it was for the best if he could avoid having that something with someone like Nico Robin, or the bizarre doctor/Animal "But you know exactly what I mean; Joker commanded you to find something about this in Vegapunk's notes, right?"

"Unless you can get the fruit of her body, the symptoms will still be there, is not something you have to search through the notes of that man to know it" He tried to lift a hand , probably wanting to shake it in the air to emphasize the unimportance that the matter had to him, but he seemed to remember that he had handcuffs because he frowned "To use Kairoseki to hold off her powers is an interesting move since it nullifies the powers of the Akuma no Mi, but it also nullifies her strength, that's the reason she started to sleep when the ring barely touched her skin, right? A somewhat smart move, I have to say, but it merely shows how desperate she is, or should I say that the desperate one is you? You should know that something like that will only delay it" A maniacal look stood in his eyes "She's the first specimen that survived the first years of use, so I'm a little interested in what other effects has an experimental fault on the human body. Tell me something, have her organs started to fail already?"

Those words touched a really deep spot in Law's head.

And apparently scientific noticed it almost instantly, giving Law no time to make a comment, pressing the apparently sensitive point that he had apparently found.

"But who really knows what can happen?" He continued, a 'normal' expression on his face, as if the option he had given before wasn't amusing him anymore "It may reduce her lifetime, maybe nothing more will happen from now on, it maybe even get to this point and stay there" A somehow maniacal smile crossed his face again, and Law frowned even more at that "Of course, there is the possibility that she dies"

"You seem really calm considering that Joker asked explicitly about this topic" He kind of murmured, repeating several times in his head how important was that man for his plans, and for that reason he could _not_ end his life in that very moment. As much as he would like to separate his head from the rest of his body at that moment it was not favorable at all, so he decided to concentrate in other things to keep his annoyance in cheek.

"It 's not _my _head what Joker will want if she dies" A strange laugh escaped his lips, watching Law as the man didn't move a single inch from his position "It probably will be yours" He added after a second "I don't really know who that brat it, but if Joker had wanted her to live since so long ago, it means that it was not in his plans for her to be with you" He tilted his head to one side, smiling in the same way "And I think we both know what happens when something doesn't go according to the plan"

"You've talked a lot for today" The hand that he placed in the hilt of his sword achieve to shut him and wipe the smile off his place, placing a scared look in its place. Deep down Law was willing to use his powers to him, because it was not like he could kill him that way, and apparently his intentions were something that Caesar could see at that moment because he didn't dare to make another comment, staying silent until he closed his eyes and fell asleep. The Shichibukai let out a frustrated sigh when he was sure that no one could hear hi, massaging his temple with one hand.

He had not expected much from that conversation from the beginning.

But it was not as if he needed Caesar to remind him what could or could not happen to Yue at any second, because it was something Law knew by heart. In the last years he had had plenty of time to imagine infinite possibilities, each one worse than the last one, and the pass of the time did nothing but tell him every day that each one of those scenarios were getting probable- it had been months since he'd gotten the ring made out of Kairoseki, and although he would prefer to ignore it Law knew that Caesar was right, _it was _a desperate measure.

But that was what he felt the first time that Yue had coughed blood after a battle against the marines, despair. The ring was something that had allowed him to clear his mind enough to focus in his plans.

At the moment when the newspaper touches the deck of the ship, it would be an all or nothing. He had planned this moment for so long that for a single second Law wondered if it was going exactly how he had imagined for the past years or if there was the possibility of something unexpected to happen, although it was almost literally impossible. Law didn't like to lose, but Doflamingo liked it less and no matter what he decided to chose he wouldn't be completely victorious- he had not been joking when he'd said through Vergo's Den Den Mushi that now there was nothing that could stop the changes that were about to come.

It was what he had been expecting.

He had planned every single thing, every single moment, and every single second. He had considered every single option, and created an answer to it in his mind based on his strategy.

So he guessed as well that from the beginning it had been an all or nothing.

However...

Automatically, without really thinking about it, his eyes fell on the face of the person he had known for so many years, a person that despite he messed with her for days and days without stop had followed him through everything. He could still remember the disoriented look that she had had on her the night he woke her, the blank expression had when he told her to get dressed quickly, and how still she had stood in front of the submarine's door when she realized they were on Punk Hazard; although they had talked about it before it was not something she expected so soon, so she had turned her head at Law, waiting an explanation from him.

Law didn't have one.

But she, shrugging, looking over her shoulder to say goodbye to the crew, had followed him.

She could have stayed at the submarine- they had thought about that option as well.

She could have said something.

She could have tried to stop him.

But she didn't even seemed to think about the possibility of doing so.

She simply followed him, even thought she knew how close to the danger they would be.

And Law knew_ it_.

If all went as planned, he knew he would be taking her to the place she had been avoiding the last few years- the place where the chances of something going wrong for her were endless, where it was not possible to control all the factors, where if she let her guard down only for one second all her work would go down.

The place that Yue had once known as a 'home'.

The place where that man probably already had a cage ready to lock her inside it at the first chance.

Something that Law was not even willing to offer.


End file.
